tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-298763142017-08-15T11:28:15.752-04:00Rippling BrainwavesInformation dropping infrequently from my brain into a vast ocean of network packets.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.comBlogger450125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-48921202668927317302017-07-15T10:23:00.001-04:002017-07-15T10:23:20.165-04:00upon further contemplationI'm guessing this won't come as a shock: the sweeping advice that <i>more faith </i>would've prevented my unbelief fails to dazzle me. From my standpoint it seems equivalent to the bullheaded instruction, "You should have&nbsp;<i>never</i>&nbsp;let yourself revise what you think, no matter what well-grounded information came along, or how implausible or problematic your preferred idea was shown to be." I knowingly discarded the beliefs after open-eyed judgment. If more faith is seriously intended as a <i>defense</i> tactic, then it has a strong resemblance to the ostrich's. (The inaccuracy of the head-burying myth can be ignored for the sake of lighthearted analogy...)<br /><br />I'm more entertained, but no more convinced, by <i>specific</i> recommendations that would've fortified my beliefs. <i>Contemplative</i> prayer's assorted techniques fit this category. These are said to improve the follower's soul through the aid of quietness, ritual, reflection, and focus. The soul is methodically opened up to unearthly influence. It's pushed to develop an engrossing portrayal of the supernatural realm. It's taught to frequently note and gather signs of this portrayal's existence. The edifying periods of intense concentration might be guided by spiritual mottoes, textual studies, mental images, dogmas. Intervals of fasting and solitude might be employed to heighten attentiveness. Presumably, all this effort goes toward two interlocking goals. First is an inspiring appreciation of God. Second is often having in-depth, warm, productive connections with God, at both scheduled and unscheduled times. Zealous contemplators like to declare that they're "in a relationship, not a religion" and that they walk and talk with God.<br /><br />Nevertheless, I wouldn't rashly accuse them of telling <i>deliberate lies</i>&nbsp;about the phenomena their techniques lead to. Aside from the embellishment and reinterpretation that inevitably slip in, I don't assume that they're fabricating their <i>entire</i> reports. Dreams aren't perceptible outside of the dreamer's brain either, but that doesn't imply that no dreaming occurred. When they say they sense God, I'm willing to accept that their <i>experience of</i> <i>sensing</i>&nbsp;was triggered in them somehow. If an experience roughly corresponds to the activation of a brain region, then purposely activating the region could recall the experience. Anywhere in the world, a whiff of favorite food can conjure a memory of home.<br /><br />The actual gap is between the meaning that <i>they</i> attribute to their contemplative techniques and the meaning that <i>I</i> attribute. They claim that they're harnessing the custom-made age-old wisdom of their particular tradition to come into contact with their unique God. But when I reexamine their techniques in a greater context, I can't avoid noticing the many close similarities with sophisticated&nbsp;<i>psychological training</i>. I'm referring to training by the broadest nonjudgmental definition. We're social creatures who have highly flexible brains. We're training each other and ourselves, by large and small degrees, constantly though not always consciously, for a host of admirable or despicable reasons. Where they perceive specialized paths to divinity, I perceive the unexceptional shaping of patterns of behavior and thinking.<br /><br />No matter the topic, a complicated abstraction is usually a challenge for psychological training. Extra care is needed to ensure that it's memorable, understood, relevant, and stimulating. A number of ordinary exercises and factors can help. Undisturbed repetition is foremost. Obviously, over the short term it stops the abstraction from promptly fading or being pushed out by distractions. But for the knowledge to persist, undisturbed repetition shouldn't be crushed into a single huge session. It should be broken up into several, preferably with evenly spaced time in-between. Each should build on top of the previous. Old items should be reviewed before new items. It also helps when the material is itself put in a repetitive and thoughtful form, in which parts of the new items are reminiscent of parts of the old items. Mnemonics, rhymes, and alliteration have benefits other than stylistic flourishes. <br /><br />Better still is to supplement undisturbed repetition with active processing. Asking and answering questions about the abstraction forces it to come alive and be comprehended. The questions should be decisive and piercing, not vague, superficial, and easy. The aim is greater clarity. A clear abstraction appears surer and realer than a hazy one. Its familiarity increases as it's meditated on and reused. A secondary effect of active processing is to establish its links to other ideas. Its <i>distinguishing</i> characteristics are exposed. Its boundaries are drawn. It ceases to be a mysterious, remote, solitary blob. Instead it's nestled firmly in its known position by neighboring ideas: it's a bit like <i>this</i>&nbsp;and a bit unlike <i>that</i>.<br /><br />If possible, the active processing should include personalizing the abstraction. A person may or may not be permitted to <i>adapt</i> it to suit themselves. But in either case, they can translate it into their own words and the symbols they find significant. And they can try to pinpoint informative overlaps between it and their larger perspective. Applying it to a their vital concerns instantly raises its value in their thoughts. Lastly, to the extent that it influences their individual choices, it accumulates a kind of undeniable role in their personal history from then on.<br /><br />Personalizing an abstraction works because brains have an innate talent for pouncing on information that affects the self. Stories and sense perception are two more brain talents that can be successfully targeted. The brain already has skills for absorbing concrete narratives and sensations. A compelling story is superior at conveying the qualities of someone or something. Visualizing something abstract aids in delivering it into consciousness, regardless of whether the visualization is merely a temporary metaphor. Paradoxical as it sounds, attaching many little sensory details can sometimes be beneficial for retention. Vividness enables an abstraction to grab and hold a bigger slice of awareness. Excessively minimal or dull descriptions engage less of the brain. Although a concise summary is quicker to communicate than a series of differing examples, the series invokes sustained attention. The multiple examples present multiple chances, using several variations, to make at least one enduring impression.<br /><br />For mostly the same reason, adding a factor of emotion works too: it's a "language" which is built into the brain. It marks information as important. It boosts alertness toward an abstraction. Meanwhile, the flow of associations pushes an understanding of its parts. The parts to be opposed—problems or enemies—are enclosed by a repelling frame. The parts to be welcomed—solutions or allies—are enclosed by an appealing frame. A thorough bond between emotion and an abstraction can last and last. Its potency could potentially rival or exceed the potency of a bond to a tangible object. Such objects can be hobbled by the fatal shortcomings of realistic weaknesses and complex mixes of advantages and disadvantages, which bind to conflicting emotions.<br /><br />It so happens that all these considerations feature prominently in the contemplative techniques that would've hypothetically sheltered me from unbelief. That's why I conceded earlier that diligent practice of the techniques probably <i>does</i> fulfill the promise...according to the contemplator. When psychological training is carried out well, I'd <i>expect</i> it to be effective at introducing and reinforcing craftily constructed abstractions. The end results are that numerous stimuli spontaneously give rise to the cultivated ideas. The ideas become the lenses for observing everything else. Dislodging them to make room for contrary thoughts starts to feel, um, unthinkable. Contemplators see themselves producing subtler insight into the being that created them and provided them an Earth to live on. People like me see them producing subtler refinements of the being they're continuously creating and for whom they've provided a brain to "live" in.<br /><br />However, contemplation is doomed to be a flawed source of&nbsp;<i>proof</i>&nbsp;because it has no essential differences from the "more faith" remedy I first criticized. It often functions independently of tested realities outside the brain's. When it's relying on imaginative modes, it operates separately from <i>rigorous</i> argumentation, pro or con. If I'd been more accomplished at it, would my escape have been longer and wobblier? I suppose. Yet I question that I could've fended it off forever.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-61910711186501803622017-06-23T09:44:00.001-04:002017-06-23T09:44:07.213-04:00environmental contamination <div>When people discard their beliefs about the supernatural, they pose a troubling but inescapable question to those they left behind: <i>why?</i> What prompts someone to alter their allegiances so drastically, after ingesting the One Truth for years and years? They opt to comfort themselves with a medley of convenient explanations. For instance, similar to their obsessions with "purity" in other domains, they can suggest that the apostate's thinking was <i>contaminated.</i>&nbsp;Wicked lies must have poisoned their beliefs, which were originally perfect and intact. If the crafty sabotage had been resisted, the beliefs would've been preserved indefinitely.<br /><br />In rigid situations, this suggestion really could succeed. Like an impermeable museum display box enclosing an ancient artifact, total isolation <i>does</i> prevent or slow changes to hardened opinions. This is exactly why stricter groups tightly restrict their members' access to outside information in full or in part. The separation is sometimes enforced through an explicit set of rules, sometimes through the social pressure of the group's treatment of the offender.<br /><br />The obvious weakness with this practice is that it must be <i>extreme</i>, or else contamination will creep in somehow at some time. If the follower is determined to circumvent the barriers, and they're not under constant surveillance and confinement, it <i>will</i> probably fail sooner or later. But if the follower opts for the opposite reaction of <i>internalizing</i>&nbsp;the barriers, the risk of "contamination" drops to near nil. They resolve to act as their own sentinel, eagerly watching out for and squashing potential threats to the beliefs they follow.<br /><br />When I was younger, I was more like the willing participant than the rebel. I didn't <i>want</i> to consume media that was openly antagonistic to the core beliefs I had. I knew such media would've upset me, so it didn't feel like an appealing use of my time. And in that period I categorized myself as an unshakable follower; I wasn't especially worried about wading into unending philosophical wars. I hadn't dissected my assumptions enough yet. The most potent issue of all, the problem of evil, wasn't <i>urgent</i> to me yet because, er, things in my surrounding egocentric awareness were largely pleasant.<br /><br />Surprisingly (...or not...), the contamination of my thoughts happened anyway. I didn't need to search far and long for alternatives. As it turned out, these were lurking in my <i>environment</i>. Standard biological evolution is one example of a subject that I eventually stumbled on without trying.&nbsp;I didn't bother to read a lot about it or biology or creationism or Earth's age. The religious groups I was in didn't heavily emphasize the importance of rejecting it, although some individuals, such as the parents who home-schooled, did enthusiastically inject it into discussions. I thought of it as "controversial" among believers—like disagreeing about Bible editions—so perhaps I was cynical that a closer look would give me a firm, worthwhile answer.<br /><br />My neutrality shifted in high school after someone lent me their copy of the slyly written <i>Darwin's Black Box</i>. It presented "intelligent design" through a breezy mixture of easy-to-read prose, arguments built on commonplace analogies like mousetraps, and technicalities drawn from biochemistry. It provided lengthy chemical names. But like a "For Dummies" book, the major points didn't require deep understanding. In comparison with past creationist works, its official position was "moderate": its single-minded focus was on the alleged infeasibility of gradually evolving microscopic cellular systems, rather than on completely refuting all evolution. Moreover, it underlined its attempt at moderation by conspicuously declining to offer a name for the off-stage Designing Intelligence. No quotations from sacred texts were included. It didn't ask for agreement with dogma. Like typical science books sold to the wide market, it was hopefully aimed at anyone with a casual interest. Sections nearer to the end spelled out the ostensible goal, which wasn't to justify a belief in the author's preferred god. It was to achieve the status of <i>legitimate counterbalancing science.&nbsp;</i><br /><br />After I returned the book, I mostly didn't think about it. I did note that neither it nor its intelligent design ideology were in major news outlets or publications, except in quotes by public figures such as George W. Bush. Biology certainly hadn't been triumphantly upended. In a few years I had perpetual access to broadband internet at college, so one lazy day I remembered it and performed a spontaneous internet search. I discovered that the reasoning of <i>Darwin's Black Box</i> had been speedily dismantled right when it came out. Its list of biochemical challenges was countered by plausible evolutionary pathways. After observing its low reputation in the eyes of the majority of specialists, my previous naive trust in it sank. Of course, if I hadn't read it, maybe I wouldn't have been motivated to browse evolution-favoring websites in the first place.<br /><br />This wasn't the last time that the one-sided clash of evolution and intelligent design sprang from my environment into my thoughts. <i>Kitzmiller v. Dover</i>&nbsp;came along. It was a trial about inserting references to intelligent design into the curriculum of public school science classes. The author of <i>Darwin's Black Box</i> was one of the witnesses. His ridiculed answers were disastrous for his cause. Although a courtroom isn't the appropriate setting for scientific judgments, the verdict was unequivocal and impressive. Intelligent design wasn't suitable for science class in public school. My vaguely noncommittal attitude turned strongly in favor of evolution. To repeat, I already knew there were believes like I who admitted evolution's accuracy, so this adjustment <i>didn't</i>&nbsp;push me to reconsider everything.<br /><br />Anyway, biology and geology weren't my usual subjects when I was at the library or the bookstore. I was intrigued by physics and psychology. Nevertheless, these areas transmitted contaminants too. I was nonchalantly skipping books about atheism, but I <i>was</i> reading books that relayed information in the absence of religious slants or premises. I learned that up-to-date physics was amazingly engaging, extensive, and confirmed. But unlike religion, its various findings didn't support the story that anything related to humans, or specifically human-like, was central to the "purpose" or the functioning of the cosmos. In big scales and small, human concerns and abilities weren't essential. Despite their supreme cleverness, they were one species on one planet. Fundamentally they were derivative. They were built out of atomic ingredients and dependent on numerous strategies to redirect entropy for a while.<br /><br />I absorbed the implicit style of mostly leaving ghostly stuff out of normal physics phenomena. I just assumed that the divine and demonic realms existed apart and parallel in some undetectable, undefined way. The realms' <i>understated</i> interventions on the mundane plane were generally compatible with physics—recovering from an infection or obtaining a new job—except on rare occasions such as starting the universe or resurrecting. In short, the arrangement I settled on was a popular one: more physics<i>-plus</i>&nbsp;than <i>anti-</i>physics. My thoughts were contaminated by an acknowledgment of physics' effectiveness at comprehending things. The symptom of this contamination was that by default I inferred particles and forces at work everywhere, not spirits.<br /><br />As for psychology, religion's role was more prominent. The trouble was that its role was so frequently described as <i>harmful</i>. It could be tied in with a patient's delusions of paranoia or megalomania, or lead to anxious guilt, or shortsightedly stifle the real root causes of distress. Some thinkers labeled it a sophisticated manifestation of...an infantile coping mechanism. I took some offense at that, though I did take the hint to ensure my beliefs about the supernatural weren't reducible to direct gratification of my emotional needs.<br /><br />One memory that's grown funnier to me is my head-spinning encounter with the book that grabbed me with its overwrought title,&nbsp;<i>The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind</i>.&nbsp;It explained the Bible as reports of ancient auditory<i> hallucinations</i>. I wasn't nearly ready to take its argument seriously, so its raw effect on me was more emotional in nature than intellectual. I was engulfed in the initial shock that this kind of bold speculation dared to <i>exist</i>. It was inviting me to demote the Bible to a mythological text and the voice of God to a trick of the brain. I hadn't faced these irreverent options so bluntly before. It was like an "out-of-belief experience", temporarily floating out and above the ideas and looking down at them like any collection of cultural artifacts. My faith stayed where it was, but I didn't forget the dizzying sensation of <i>questioning all of it</i>.<br /><br />I don't want to give the wrong impression about packing my leisure time with education. I read lots of fiction too. Yet it wasn't an environment free from contamination either. When I looked up more of the works by two authors of fiction I'd enjoyed, Isaac Asimov and Douglas Adams, I collided with more atheists again. I read Asimov's "The Reagan Doctrine" online. It was short, but it was so self-possessed and methodical in the facts it applied to break apart the false equivalence of religiosity and moral trustworthiness.<br /><br />After Adams' death, I bought <i>The Salmon of Doubt&nbsp;</i>without skimming through it. I was anticipating the unfinished Dirk Gently portion. I hadn't known what else was in it. It contained a number of Adams' non-fiction essays and interviews, and several of these featured his strikingly <i>unapologetic</i> atheism. For example, he created the metaphor of an ignorant puddle declaring that its perfectly fitting hole must have been created for itself. I hadn't purchased a book centered around atheism, but nonetheless I had purchased a book with passages that were cheerily atheistic. In the environment of fiction I'd been contaminated by the the realization that there were people who were convinced that I'd been gravely misled all my life...<i>and</i>&nbsp;who had written stuff I liked...<i>and</i>&nbsp;who seemed good-humored and reasonable. They weren't any more detestable or foolish than us followers.<br /><br />This realization didn't spin me around 180 degrees. Nothing ever did. My reversal was the result of a fitful sequence of <i>little</i>&nbsp;(20-degree?) turns. However, there were a few sources of contamination that immediately&nbsp;<i>preceded</i>&nbsp;my breakthrough: artificial intelligence, information theory, and cognitive science. Like the rest of the contaminants, these didn't develop overnight but started out as innocent-looking seeds. The earliest crucial one was Jeremy Campbell's <i>The Improbable Machine</i>. I was a teen when I picked up this book on impulse (the store had steeply cut its price). It was a wide-ranging exploration of the theme of <i>connectionism</i>: artificial intelligence by mimicry of the brain's evolved layout of legions of tiny interconnected units acting cooperatively. According to it, the opposite extreme was the route of translating all the brain's abilities into orderly chains of logic.<br /><br />Before, I'd been accustomed to assigning artificial intelligence to the narrow project of constructing bigger and bigger&nbsp;<i>logic machines</i>—the fragile sort that Captain Kirk could drive insane with a handful of contradictory statements. Campbell's thesis was that connectionism was a promising model for the brain's more&nbsp;<i>soulful</i> traditional powers: intuitive leaps, creativity, perception, interpretation of ambiguous language, etc. I was accidentally contaminated by the faint suspicion that souls, i.e. nonphysical spirits/minds, weren't strictly necessary for doing whatever the brain does. I began to imagine that the puzzle was only difficult and complex, not doomed to failure by mind-matter dualism. Tracing the brain's powers to its very&nbsp;<i>structure</i>&nbsp;had the long-term side-effect of casting doubt on blaming something&nbsp;<i>inhabiting</i> the structure.<br /><br />A decade later, I returned to these topics. My career in software was underway. I regularly visited blogs by other software developers. The recommendation to try<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">&nbsp;</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">Gödel, Escher, Bach&nbsp;</i>showed up more than once. I ignored it for a long time because of my preconceptions. When I finally gave it a chance, Hofstadter's compelling effort stirred my curiosity. I moved on to devouring more of his, and I also checked for more of Campbell's. This time I sped through&nbsp;<i>Grammatical Man,</i>&nbsp;which ignited a prolonged fascination with information theory. I consumed more on this subject. And I paired it with cognitive science, because I wanted to know more about the brain's dazzling usage of information. Amazon's automatic recommendations were helpful. Some books probing consciousness concentrated more on anatomy and some more on philosophical dilemmas. My first Daniel Dennett buy wasn't <i>Breaking The Spell</i>, it was <i>Consciousness Explained</i>.<br /><br />The accelerating consequences were unstoppable. My desire had been to read about how people think, but the details were often contaminated with well-constructed criticisms of the whole principle of the soul. I'd once been confident that the mystery of inner experiences was <i>invincible</i>. It was a gap that my faith could keep occupying even when all else could be accommodated by nonreligious accounts. Instead, this gap was filled in by the increasingly likely possibility that inner experiences were essentially <i>brain actions.</i><br /><br />For me, the scales were tipped. The debate was decided. All the signs of an immaterial layer of reality had been exposed as either absent, illogical, fraudulent or illusory, or at best ambiguously unconvincing. I recognized that I <i>could</i> continue believing...but if I did it would be with the shortcoming that the unsatisfying "truth" of the beliefs exerted no distinguishable difference on reality. If I'd then been familiar with Carl Sagan, I could've compared the beliefs' contents to his famous illustration of an invisible, silent, incorporeal dragon in the garage.<br /><br />I made a slow, deliberate choice between two sides. Contrary to the contamination excuse, interfering outsiders weren't responsible for misleading me. I wasn't playing with fire, either intentionally or not. I didn't hastily abandon my beliefs as soon as I became aware of another stance. I wasn't an impressionable simpleton who thoughtlessly trusted the internet. Enlarging my knowledge didn't forcibly corrupt or "turn" me. The hazard was never in merely <i>seeing</i> the other side. It was in paying close attention to what each side used to validate itself. The pivotal contamination was learning that the <i>other</i> side pointed to data, mathematics, self-consistency, appreciation of common flaws in human cognition, and prudent restraint before relying on unverified beliefs. But as for the side I'd been taught...</div><ul></ul>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-16027211011369645712017-05-29T22:01:00.001-04:002017-05-29T22:01:33.699-04:00follies of ethnocentrismMore and more as of late, I've noticed that commentary about right-wing American evangelicals has been asserting that their racist leanings are beyond question. I realize that there is&nbsp;<i>excellent</i> past and present evidence that supports this generalization. I agree that, for a substantial portion of them, it's applicable.<br /><div><br /></div><div>However, in the portion who I know through <i>personal</i> experience—which I confess only represents a subgroup of a subgroup—the prejudice I detect is a smidge more complex...or at least flows along more complex channels. For lack of a better label, I'll use "the respectables" to refer to this set. (Yes, I'm glad to report that I'm familiar with some whose warmhearted behaviors and outlooks are unobjectionable. I'm not referring to them.) The respectables are shocked by accusations of racism. After all, they never suggest that race is at the innermost core truth of someone. It's not a biological limit on abilities or personality. It isn't destiny. <br /><br />Part of the reason why is because the respectables treasure the sentiment that all people are targets for the duty of universal evangelism. Attendees of any race are admitted to public events. In large gatherings, some of the regular goers are likely to be in the so-called "diverse" category. Officially, all people-groups domestic and foreign need to be afforded every chance to convert. Adventurous stories of evangelism in faraway nations are more praiseworthy, not less, when the setting is "exotic", and that goes for the exoticism of the setting's races. Although the pompous and intrusive quest to Christianize all humanity is nauseating, it certainly undermines the very idea of using <i>race alone</i>&nbsp;to disqualify people.</div><div><br /></div><div>So the respectables aren't hostile toward races in theory. They don't believe (or believe but refrain from saying?) that a race is genetically inferior or superior. Adopting a child of another race is accepted, as is marrying a spouse of another race. Their anxieties have oozed in a less obvious direction. In the most general terms, they're dismissive and fearful of <i>dissimilar cultures</i>. They rank each one according to their estimate of its <i>deviation</i>&nbsp;from their own. Whatever else they're disciples of, they're disciples of <i>ethnocentrism</i>.<br /><br />Its effects are less vicious than raw racism but unfortunately are tougher to discern and exterminate. It might not motivate angry attacks, but it'll motivate avoidance, or just chilly distance. The barrier it creates isn't <i>necessarily</i> impossible to cross, but in any case it's significant. Individuals face the extra burden of first overturning the immediate verdicts that were assigned to them. They aren't utterly excluded, but they have...unsettling questions surrounding them. In the race for social status, they begin from behind the starting line.<br /><br />Like any human behavior, the kind of apprehensive ethnocentrism I'm trying to describe doesn't stay neatly contained in the boundaries of its dictionary definition. It's a frequent teammate of the racism of thinking that a race is synonymous with a culture. With this link, the outcome of stigmatizing the culture becomes, well, synonymous with stigmatizing the race. The difference is negated.<br /><br />Nevertheless, at least race isn't a unique cultural sign. Ethnocentrism's domain is broader than race, because culture itself has many details occurring in endless varieties. The list of additional cultural signs to exploit includes clothing, hair/skin styling, etiquette, economic class, language, slang, accent, geographic region, religious adornment, occupation, food/music preferences. To the ethnocentric person, race as well as any of these may end up functioning as clues of reassurance or dread about the culture that controls the stranger. Because they have rationales about why theirs is the best, they choose which signs matter the most to them and which cultures are better or worse approximations of theirs. A stranger who displays enough signs can be successfully pigeonholed as a member of an admired culture, despite showing some signs of a scorned culture too.<br /><br />Yet, ethnocentrism's potential to take several observations into account at once cannot manage to compensate for its unfair perceptions. Usually it's already committing a pivotal error: it's really sorting among slanted and incomplete <i>abstractions</i>&nbsp;(impressions, clichés) of cultures. This is to be expected. A vast culture, with a long history and a wide footprint, has numerous types and subsections and components, and upsides and downsides of each. It cannot fit as well into ethnocentrism's coarse rankings of worthiness unless it's drastically pared, flattened, summarized, frozen in time, severed from outside influences. A largely uninformed collection of selected fragments is hammered into a convenient lens. And the distorted lens is used to impatiently classify anyone who has (or seems to have) some of the signs. The problem with this result is predictable. Regardless of the culture's shared elements, it probably accommodates a host of almost opposite opinions on a host of topics. There's no visible hint to distinguish where the stranger falls in this range.<br /><br />Furthermore, patchy awareness of the culture could be magnified by patchy recognition of the various levels of influence that cultures have. In order to believe that the culture the person supposedly signifies&nbsp;<i>can sufficiently explain</i> <i>them</i>, their capacity to make their own decisions needs to be disregarded. Again there's a spectrum. Some are devotees who fully embrace it. Some opt to be nominal: primarily detach their identities from it. And some are selective in what they absorb or ignore, and these selections can change over time. Depending on their environment, they could simultaneously be selecting from <i>other</i> cultures, even if they're overlooking the logical incompatibility of the mixtures. Or to some degree they could be declining a preexisting path, instead inventing special ideas and novel ways of life. The point is that <i>perhaps</i>&nbsp;the majority of their choices are dictated by a culture, but that can only be speculation until their personal stances are known.<br /><br />The pitfalls of pursuing ethnocentrism don't end there. Its approach is characterized by warily eying culture mostly from the outside, i.e. not by talking to the participants. It should be no surprise that it's prone to <i>misinterpreting the actual practice and meaning</i>&nbsp;of the contents. The importance of context shouldn't be underestimated. Statements might not be serious or literal. Symbols might have obscure, even ironic, meanings. Problematic items might be rationalized or downplayed. To add to the confusion, the pronouncements published by "authoritative" organizations often diverge from what many of the participants genuinely think. The area of interest should be how the culture <i>is lived</i>, not on naive, superficial analyses of its minutiae. If everyone within it views a puzzling story as a mere exaggeration for dramatic effect, then highlighting the story's outlandishness accomplishes nil. An external critic's disagreement about what is and isn't a figure of speech isn't pertinent to them.<br /><br />In combination, these considerations justify being initially unmoved by the declaration, "I'm not a deplorable racist—I'm a respectable citizen who's concerned about the cultural mismatches between us <i>and them</i>". Clearly, placing focus on "culture" nonetheless provides an abundance of chances to maintain one-sided ideas about massive numbers of human beings, hastily erase all fine distinctions, and <i>typecast</i> the undeserving. The possible consequence is another pile of simplistic attitudes which are barely an improvement.<br /><br />Cerebral followers, who've learned their lines well, can swiftly repeat the customary retort to remarks such as these: the horrifying spectre of <i>moral relativism</i>. Namely, they assert that people with positions like mine are obligated to say that the morality of every piece of every culture&nbsp;<i>cannot</i> be judged consistently. But I'm not that extreme (or that hypocritical). I&nbsp;<i>cheer</i>&nbsp;well-done critique, if its aim is narrow and precise. And, as much as possible, I prefer that its aim isn't excessively pointed toward, or conspicuously <i>avoiding</i> pointing toward, any singular group of cultures. Thoughtfully learning then delicately responding to an issue isn't the same as sweeping demonization of an entire way of life or of the people who identify with it. When disputing a specific item, I want to hear an explanation of it violating a nonnegotiable ethical principle, not its level of contradiction with&nbsp;<i>sacred</i> tenets or with some alternative's "common sense". Cultures, like other human creations, have sinister corners and blind spots that thoroughly earn our distaste. But we can extend the courtesy of not <i>presuming</i> that sinister appearances are always correct and of reflecting on whether a startling difference is trivial or shallow rather than perverse.<br /><br />Sometimes this is easy to decide and sometimes not. If it were never complicated for the people deciding, I'd wonder if they're paying enough attention to the whole picture...or if, like an ethnocentrist, they make up their minds beforehand anyway.</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-73895713171458671302017-05-14T14:01:00.001-04:002017-05-14T14:01:20.768-04:00a question of substanceWhen one group in the habit of ridiculing an opposing group's beliefs, the easily attacked topics become customary. Mentioning them is so commonplace that no additional explanation is necessary anymore. They typically act as familiar, comforting reference points to casually toss in with other remarks. "Well, we shouldn't be shocked by <i>this</i>, after all. Don't ever forget that the mixed-up people we're talking about also believe _____."<br /><br />For example, the people on the other "side"—I mean those who still follow the set of beliefs that I scrapped—often parrot the superficial story that a lack of sound religious commitment forces the lack of sound ethical commitments. Their false presumption is that ethics are always shaky and individualized apart from systematized religion's supposed timelessness and objectivity. They imagine that people without religion can't have steady principles to work with. Unbelievers' <i>rootless</i> ethics are to blame for every "incorrect" view and behavior. Their morality is said to be hopelessly deficient because they're <i>inventing</i>&nbsp;right and wrong however they wish.<br /><br />At one time, I would've glibly agreed that this prejudicial story is self-evident. Needless to say, now I object to virtually every aspect of it, from start to finish. I've become part of the group it stigmatizes and seen for myself that it's wrong about us. Fortunately, we can console ourselves with the numerous targets that religious beliefs richly offer us in return. In my setting, usually these take the form of peculiar Christian myths and doctrines.&nbsp;<i>Transubstantiation</i>&nbsp;certainly fits that demand. It's the doctrine that a ritual can replace the <i>substance</i> of food and drink with the "sacred presence" of Christ. Its plain definition is enough on its own to stand out as bizarre and questionable. Quoting the belief of <i>literally</i> eating the <i>real</i> substance of a god suffices as an open invitation for biting commentary.<br /><br />Simply put, it presents endless possibilities for wisecracks. Let me emphasize that that's mostly fine with me. I'm not broadly opposed to jokes about <i>an idea</i>...especially the rare jokes which manage to be funny and original. Calling attention to an idea's absurdity shouldn't be confused with "insulting" the idea's followers. Too many nations have created oppressive laws through that confusion. Though, at the same time, the more that a joke strays off topic and verges on outright <i>jeering</i> at people, the less I like it. And back in my former days, the more likely I would've been to briskly skip over the joke's <i>message</i> altogether.<br /><br />My quibble is something else: the humorous treatment of transubstantiation risks an underappreciation of its twisted philosophical side. When a critic shallowly but understandably chuckles that after transubstantiation the items are <i>visibly</i>&nbsp;no different than before, they're not responding to the doctrine's convoluted trickery. According to its premises, the change wouldn't be expected to be detectable anyway. Everything detectable is dismissed as an <i>attribute</i>&nbsp;(some writings use the word "accident" as a synonym of attribute). But the ritual solely replaces the <i>substance</i>.<br /><br />The distinction between attribute and substance is strange to us because it's a <i>fossil</i>&nbsp;from old debates. These debates' original purpose was to analyze the relationships among the multiple parts of conscious experience. If someone senses one of their house's interior walls, they may see the color of its paint, feel its texture, measure its height, and so on and so on. Ask them twenty questions about it, and the responses build a long list of attributes. After the wall is repainted or a nail is driven into it to hang a picture, then a few of the wall's attributes have changed. But the wall is still a wall. The substance of what it is hasn't changed. After a demolition crew has blasted away at a brick wall, and left behind a chunk, the chunk is still a wall; it's a wall with smaller attributes. In this scheme, a thing's substance is more like an indirect quality, while direct observations of the thing yield its attributes. The attributes are the mask worn by the thing's substance, and the mask has no holes.<br /><br />The transubstantiation doctrine reapplies such hairsplitting to justify itself. It proposes that the items' attribute side is kept as-is and Christ's presence is on the items' substance side. By a regularly scheduled miracle, the presence looks like the items, tastes like the items, etc. It's subtler than transformation. <i>How</i>&nbsp;exactly is the process said to occur? The answer is mystery, faith, ineffability, magic, or whatever alternative term or combination of terms is preferred. The doctrine asserts something extraordinary, but then again so do official doctrines about virgin births, 3 gods in 1, eternal souls. Merely saying that it violates common sense isn't enough; common sense can be faulty. And merely highlighting its silly logical implications doesn't address its base flaws.<br /><br />I think it's a fruitful exercise to articulate why the core of it, the split between attribute and substance, isn't plausible. The first reason is probably uncontroversial to everybody whose beliefs are consistent with materialistic naturalism: human knowledge has progressed in the meantime. We can catalog an extensive set of a thing's <i>innate</i> "attributes" through reliable methods. The discoveries have led to the <i>standpoint</i> of understanding a thing through its attributes of chemical <i>composition, </i>i.e. the mixture of molecules of matter within it and the molecules' states. This standpoint is deservedly applauded for its wide effectiveness because, as far as anyone has convincingly shown, human-scale attributes derive from these composition attributes. (Emergence is a strikingly&nbsp;<i>complex</i> <i>form</i> of derivation. Its turbulent results are collectively derived from the intricate combinations of many varied interactions in a large population.)<br /><br />Asking another twenty questions to gather more attributes isn't necessary. Ultimately, the composition attributes are exhaustive. Removing or modifying these wouldn't leave untouched a remaining hypothetical "substance" of some kind. These have eliminated the gap in explanation that substance was filling in. These aren't on the surface like the attributes obtained by crudely examining a thing's appearance. The suggestion that all factual examination only goes as deep as a thing's outside shell of attributes stops sounding reasonable when modern examination is fully sophisticated and penetrating.<br /><br />The second reason why the split between attribute and substance isn't plausible is more debatable, although I sure restate it a lot here: the <i>meanings</i> of thoughts should be yoked with actions and realities (outcomes of actions). The connections might be thinly stretched and/or roundabout. At the moment the actions might only be <i>projected</i> by the corresponding thought(s), but if so then there are unambiguous predictions of the real outcomes once (or if) the projected actions take place. The actions might be transformations of thoughts by the brain: recognition, generalization, deduction, translation, calculation, estimation. Under this rule, thoughts of either a thing's attributes or of its substance could mean less than initially assumed.<br /><br />Attributes are marked by tight association with particular actions considered in isolation. Wall color is associated with the action of eyeing the wall while it's well-lit or capturing an image with a device that has a sufficient gamut. A wall dimension is associated with the action of laying a tape measure along it from end to end, for instance. Substance is marked by the inexact action of classifying things, perhaps for the goal of communicating successfully about them using apt words. It's an abstraction of a cluster of related characteristics. For a wall, a few of these characteristics are shape, i.e. length and height longer than depth, and function, i.e. enclosing an interior space from an exterior space. When the thing matches "enough" of the cluster, the average person would lean toward classifying it as a wall.<br /><br />The <i>observer</i> is the one who decides whether to treat a characteristic as a flexible attribute or a member in the abstract cluster of a given thing's "essential substance". This is in line with the composition standpoint, which conveys that particles are indifferent to the more convenient labels people use for larger formations. There isn't anything embedded in each particle that evokes one of these categories over the other. The composition standpoint asserts that particles of the same kind are freely interchangeable if the particles' relevant physical properties are alike.<br /><br />Indeed, particle interchangeability happens to be doubly significant because, as we all know, things deteriorate. A thing's owners may choose to repair or replace its degraded pieces. When they do, they've removed, added, and altered a multitude of its particles. Yet they may willingly <i>declare</i> that the thing is "the same" thing that it was before, just marginally better. In other words, the substance of it hasn't been lost. Like the famous Ship of Theseus, cycles of restoration could eventually eliminate most of the thing's original particles—which may be presently buried in landfills or turned to ashes by fire. Meanwhile biological contexts withstand continual flows of particles too, as cells die, multiply, adapt. If the action of declaring a thing's substance "unchanged" continues on despite its shifting composition, then the meaning of its substance apparently isn't even bound to <i>the thing's matter itself</i>. Part of the substance has to be a subjective construction.<br /><br />Nevertheless, the consequence isn't that the entire thought of substance must be discarded as utterly false or fake. The coexistence of objective and subjective parts underpins a host of useful thoughts—such as self-identity. Rather, the need is to <i>remember</i> all the parts of the meaning of substance, to avoid the mistake of interpreting it as if it's an independent quantity or quality. Such a mistake could possibly feed the curious conjecture that a wielder of uncanny powers can seamlessly substitute these independently-existing substances upon request...Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-2880007193407612082017-04-16T11:28:00.001-04:002017-04-16T11:28:19.094-04:00fudge-topped double fudge dipped in fudgeTwo truisms to start with. First, finite creatures like us don't have the ability to swiftly uncover all the details of each large/complex thing or situation. However, we still need to work with such things in order to do all sorts of necessary tasks. Second, we may combat our lack of exhaustive knowledge about single cases by extracting and documenting&nbsp;<i>patterns</i>&nbsp;from many cases and carefully fashioning the patterns into reusable&nbsp;<i>models</i>.<br /><div><br /></div><div>I'm using "model" in a philosophically broad sense: it's an abstracted symbolic representation which is suitable for specifying or explaining or predicting. It's a sturdy set of concepts to aid the work of manipulating the information of an object. This work is done by things such as human brains or computing machines. The model feeds into them, or it guides them, or it's generated by them. It reflects a particular approach to envisioning, summarizing, and interpreting its object. Endless forms of models show up in numerous fields. Sometimes a thoroughly intangible model can nonetheless be more tangible and understandable than its "object" (a raw scatter plot?).&nbsp;</div><div><br /></div><div>Some models are sketchy or preliminary, and some are refined. Some seem almost indistinguishable from the represented object, and some seem surprising and obscure. A model might include mathematical expressions. It might include clear-cut declarations about the object's characteristic trends, causes, factors, etc. The most prestigious theories of settled science are the models that merit the most credence. But many models are adequate without reaching that rare tier. Whether a model is informal or not, its construction is often slow and painstaking; it comes together by logically analyzing all the information that can be gathered. It's unambiguous, though it might be overturned or superseded eventually. It's fit to be communicated and taught. Chances are, other models of high quality were the bedrock for it; if not, then at minimum these others aren't <i>contradictions&nbsp;</i>of it. It's double-checked and cross-checked. Its sources are identifiable.</div><div><br /></div><div>Despite the toil that goes into it, the fact is that a typical model is probably incomplete. Comprehensive, decisive data and brilliant insights could be in short supply. Or portions of the model could be&nbsp;<i>intentionally</i>&nbsp;left incomplete/approximate on behalf of practical simplicity. When relevant features vary widely and chaotically from case to case, <i>inflexible</i> models would be expected to perfectly match no case besides the "average". Perhaps it's even possible to model the model's shortcomings, e.g. take a produced number and increase it by 15%.<br /><br />For whatever reason, the model and some cases will differ to some extent...but improving the model to completely eliminate the individual differences would be infeasible. So the disparity from the model is <i>fudged</i>. I'm using this verb as broadly as I'm using "model". It's whenever the person applying the model decides on an ad hoc <i>adjustment</i> through their preferred vague mix of miscellaneous estimations, hunches, heuristics, and bendable guidelines. Hopefully they've acquired an effective mix beforehand through trial and error. (The result of fudging may be referred to as "a fudge".)<br /><br />If a realm of understanding is said to be an art as much as a science, then the model is the science and the fudging is the art. In the supposed contrast of theory with practice, the model is the theory and the fudging is one part of the practice. The model is a purer ideal and the fudging is a messier manifestation of the collision with the complexity of circumstance. The model is generally transparent and the fudging is generally opaque. Importantly, a person's model is significantly easier for a second person to recreate than their fudging.<br /><br />The crux is that <i>a bit</i> of a fudge, especially if everyone is candid about it, is neither unusual nor a serious problem. But overindulgence rapidly becomes a cause for concern. The styles of thinking that characterize normal fudging are acceptable as humble supplements to models <i>but not as</i> <i>substitutes</i>. One possible issue is reliance on implicit, unchecked assumptions. Models embody assumptions too, but model assumptions undergo frank sifting as the model is ruthlessly juxtaposed with real cases of its object.<br /><br />Another issue is the temptation to cheat: work backwards <i>every</i> time and keep quiet about the appalling inconsistencies among the explanations offered. Someone's slippery claim of fudging their way to the exact answer in case A through simple (<i>in retrospect</i>) steps 1, 2, and 3 should lose credibility after they proceed to claim that they fudged their way to the altogether different exact answer in case B through simple (again, <i>in retrospect</i>) alternative steps 1', 2', and 3'. A model would impose a requirement of self-coherency—or impose the inescapable confession that today's model clashes with yesterday's, and the models' underlying "principles" have been whims.<br /><br />Yet another issue is the natural predisposition to forget and gloss over the cases whenever fudging was mistaken. The challenge is that new memories attach through, then later are reactivated through, interconnections with prior ideas. But a mismatch implies that the fudging and the case <i>don't</i> have the interconnections. The outcome is that a lasting memory of the mismatch won't form naturally. The primal urge to efficiently seek out relations between ideas comes with the side effect of <i>not</i>&nbsp;expending memory to note the dull occurrence of ideas <i>not </i>having relations. After being picked up, unrecorded misses automatically drift out of memory, like the background noise of an average day. A rigid model counteracts this hole because it enforces conscious extra effort.<br /><br />The issues with replacing modeling with too many fudges don't stop there. A sizable additional subcategory stems from the customary risk of fudging: judging between hypothetical realities by the nebulous "taste" of each. That method&nbsp;<i>would</i> be allowable...as long as a person's sense of taste for reality is both finely calibrated and subjected to ongoing correction as needed. Sadly, these conditions are frequently not met. Some who imagine that their taste meets the conditions may in actuality be complacent egotists who're incapable of recognizing their taste's flaws.<br /><br />A few comparisons will confirm that overrated gut feelings and "common" sense originate from personal <i>contexts</i>&nbsp;of experience and culture. Divergent experiences and cultures <i>produce</i> divergent gut feelings and common sense. An infallible ability to sniff out reality wouldn't emerge unless the sniffer were blessed with an infallible context. That's...extremely improbable. Someone in an earlier era might have confidently said, "My long-nurtured impression is that it's quite proper to reserve the privilege and responsibility of voting to the kind of men who own land. Everybody with common sense is acutely aware of the blatant reality that the rest of the population cannot be trusted to make tough political decisions. Opening the vote to them strikes me as foolhardy in the innermost parts of my being."<br /><br />But context is far from the sole way to affect taste. Propagandists (and marketers) know that <i>repetition</i> is an underestimated strategy. Monotonous associations lose the taste of strangeness. Once someone has "heard a lot" about an assertion, they're more likely to recall it the next time they're figuring out what to think just by fudging. Its influence is boosted further if it's echoed by multiple channels of information. For people who sort reality by taste, its status doesn't need to achieve airtight certainty to be a worthwhile success. Success is achieving the equivocal status that there "must be <i>something</i> to it" because it's been reiterated. A fog of unproven yet pigheaded assertions would be too insubstantial to meaningfully revise a model, but with enough longevity it can evidently spoil or sweeten a reality's taste by a few notches.<br /><br />Repetition is clumsy, though. Without a model to narrow its focus, the taste for reality is susceptible to cleverer attacks. Taste is embodied in a brain packed with attractions and aversions. The ramification is that emotional means can greatly exaggerate scarce support. A scrap in a passionately moving&nbsp;frame manages to alter taste very well. In the midst of weighing perspectives by impromptu fudging, the <i>stirring</i> one receives disproportionate attention. If the scale has been tilted masterfully, someone will virtually <i>recoil</i> from the competing perspectives. Gradually establishing the plausibility of a model is a burden compared to merely tugging on the psychological reins.<br /><br />If distorting taste by exploiting the taster's wants seems brazen, the subtler variation is exploiting what the taster <i>wants to believe</i>. It may be said that someone is already half-convinced of notions that would fit snugly into their existing thoughts. The desire for a <i>tidy</i> outlook can be a formidable ally. It's not peculiar to favor the taste of a reality with fewer independent pieces and pieces that aren't in dischord. The more effortlessly the pieces fall into place, the better. Purposefully crafting the experience that a proposal gratifies this component of taste is like crafting the experience that it's as sound as a mathematical theorem. It will appear not only right but indisputable. Searching will immediately stop, because what other possibility could be more satisfying? ...Then again, some unexpected yet well-verified models have been valued all the more as thrilling antidotes to small-mindedness.<br /><br />This extended list of weaknesses suggests that compulsive fudgers are the total opposite of model thinkers. However, the universe is complicated, so boundaries blur. To repeat from earlier, model thinkers regularly have the need to fudge the admitted limits of the models. And the reverse has been prevalent at various times and locations in human history: fudge after fudge leads to the eventual fabrication of a <i>quasi-model</i>. The quasi-model might contain serviceable fragments laid side by side with drivel. It might contain a combination of valid advice and invalid rationales for the advice. The quasi-model is partially tested, but the records of its testing tend to be patchy and expressed in all-or-nothing terms. It could be passed down from generation to generation in one unit, but there's uncertainty about <i>which</i> parts have passed or failed testing and to what degree.<br /><br />Once someone does something more than fudge in regard to the quasi-model, it might <i>develop into</i> a legitimate model. Or, its former respectability might be torn down. The dividing line between quasi-model and model is a matter of judgment. If it's resting on fudges on top of fudges, then signs point to quasi-model.</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-83417808116767554482017-03-27T20:50:00.001-04:002017-03-27T20:50:41.878-04:00blotted visionsTo repeatedly insist that a popular belief is inaccurate is to invite an obvious follow-up question: then <i>why</i>&nbsp;is it popular at all? And this question turns out to have an abundance of answers as widely varied as the believers themselves and the effects the belief has in their lives. One answer that has grabbed my attention recently is that a belief can serve a function like an&nbsp;<i>inkblot test</i>. People can use it as raw material for representing and processing their thoughts. It evokes strong reactions, which they observe and analyze. It verbalizes and conceptualizes common features of being a typical human.<br /><div><br /></div><div>The strategy is like dropping iron filings near a magnet to distinguish the magnetic field. Thereafter, they may feel <i>dependent</i> on the belief playing this illuminating role for them. It becomes their ongoing lens. The well-known example is morality. Given that their own conscience has always been seen through their belief, they unimaginatively assume that the lack of the belief-lens in <i>someone else</i> implies a lack of conscience too. Their symbols are "powerful" influences on them because the symbols' power&nbsp;<i>comes from </i>them and their mental associations. From then on, invoking the symbols is a means of self-regulating—or of others in society manipulating them, of course. A few chants or a few bars of a familiar song can deftly adjust moods...<br /><div><br /></div><div>I'm reluctant to indulge this idea too far in the Jungian direction. Picturing these inkblot beliefs as sharply defined entities in a collective unconscious doesn't feel correct to me. I don't consider the primal brain that sophisticated. I'd rather say that some long-lived beliefs have a time-tested flair for recruiting and orchestrating inborn instincts. The beliefs can give a framework for interpreting the instincts and providing particular channels (again, I hesitate to presume too much by calling the channels "sublimation").<br /><br />It hardly needs to be said that the <i>potent narrative</i>&nbsp;pushed by a belief frequently distracts from its degree of accuracy. The relevant joke among non-fiction writers is "Don't let the facts spoil a good story". Captivating tales will spread rapidly regardless of the tales' (dis)honesty. Worse, stories&nbsp;<i>confined</i> by the bounds of rigorous honesty are at a disadvantage compared to the ones that aren't. Details tend to be imprecise, complex, and dispassionate, so stories with verified details tend to be more challenging and off-putting. As condescending as it sounds, for a lot of careless people in history and right now, an uncluttered story that rouses a profound&nbsp;<i>interest</i>&nbsp;in them is more effective at ensnaring their loyalty than a tangled story that's authentic. And the boost in effectiveness is virtually guaranteed if corresponding interest was intentionally cultivated in them over and over by people they trust. It's worth noting that the interest might not be baldly self-gratifying; it might be interest in having a simplistic, conquerable&nbsp;<i>scapegoat</i>.<br /><br />Clearly, the outcome may be positive or negative when a belief is able to stimulate people's drives and/or reflections like a carefully-constructed inkblot. Nor is the basic technique unique to one category of belief. In physics, "thought experiments" exercise analytical understanding. In philosophy, an insightful intellectual has referred to similar contrivances as "intuition pumps". Numerous mythologies and fables are expressly repeated not to convey historical accounts but to render an earnest&nbsp;<i>lesson</i> as vividly and memorably as possible. But creations that aren't as lesson-focused still could be written with the goal of kindling intriguing discussions. Creators choose to employ certain words and images which they expect to act as subtle yet meaningful shorthand.<br /><br />The depth of impact ensures that subjects remain susceptible to analogous inkblots&nbsp;<i>long after</i> they discard the belief. It doesn't take much for a newer instance to be reminiscent of the old. I experienced this myself when I went to&nbsp;<i>Logan</i>&nbsp;a little while back (were you thinking that I'd mention&nbsp;<i>Arrival</i>&nbsp;instead for this topic?). In this movie, Wolverine is a protective superhuman who voluntarily undergoes bloody torture to the point of death, for the sake of people who cannot save themselves. He presents himself to be pierced in place of them. He's very old. He's emotionally remote (to say the least), but once his commitment is made it's ferocious in its determination and it doesn't expire. He's closely acquainted with pain. His body doesn't deflect bullets and sharp objects like some superheroes'. After sustaining wounds that would normally kill, he just has the power to rise up again—er, almost always. Eventually he's a substitute father figure who advises against being monstrous toward others.<br /><br />Nevertheless, he's someone who knows his dangerous character faults and his many mistakes...and also someone who, after some convincing by a respected authority, seeks to do what he can to redeem himself, mitigate consequences of his existence, and repay the kindnesses he's received. He has the hope of reducing the chance that someone else will endure a life like his. He's in a battle—and the movie makes it extremely literal—against the frightening aspects of himself. He may not be "reborn as a new man", but he's prodded into behaving in changed, productive ways. He transforms from isolation and despair to a renewed mission of improving the parts of the world he decides he must.<br /><br />I was surprised by the intensity of my spontaneous responses to these inkblots, like the gushing of water flowing through a rut. Temporary appearances by these latent sentiments weren't sufficient to overturn my established judgments. But I was forcefully reminded that the beliefs I dropped, despite having critical flaws of all shapes and sizes, had exploited a striking capacity to "worm in" to my sensibilities. Although I snapped myself out of it years ago, on occasion I can recognize the unabashed appeal of impulsively clinging to something that "speaks to you" and appears to be embodying "truths too deep for words"...albeit only with the precision of an inkblot.</div></div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-33590958670472405522017-02-28T21:45:00.001-05:002017-02-28T21:45:45.953-05:00surveying the chasmIdentifying with a group doesn't stop me from critiquing the attitudes and customs <i>of some</i> who are in "my" group. This was also the case when I identified with the religious groups of my earlier years. I despised the rampant traits of ascribing the worst motives to anyone who doesn't believe in an identical god concept, reflexively distrusting anything unfamiliar, insisting on unwavering conformity to the smallest of doctrinal trivia, and so on...and so on...<br /><div><br />The grievance I have with a few atheists online is their pattern of communicating as if an unbridgeable&nbsp;<i>chasm</i>&nbsp;separates them from everyone who disagrees with them. Rather than asserting that their spirits have become holier than thou, they implicitly assert that their elevated thinking processes have, without exception, become "sounder than thou". The poor wretches on the chasm's remote side aren't like the sharp-witted people in the group. Those oafs are more or less guaranteed to suffer from confusions of all shapes and sizes. Through oppressive "faith" they're apt to adopt awful ethical principles and/or absurd statements. They might be described as objects of pity who were entangled in psychological traps during the gullibility of childhood. They do ponder about things, but they're unable to <i>really comprehend</i>&nbsp;and revise their mistakes. They don't notice self-contradictions. All expectations for them are lowered. When a low expectation is publicly met—perhaps published via a sensational, eagerly exchanged internet article—the usual arch reaction is, "No bombshell here, eh, am I right?" Commentary might feature terms like superstition, fairy tale, tooth fairy, Santa, magic, irrational, tribal, sheep, regressive, and of course hypocrite.</div><div><br />I recognize upfront that the unattractive tendency I purposely exaggerated isn't present in everyone who follows, tightly or loosely, my philosophies. Actually it might be mostly confined to a disproportionately loud, attention-grabbing minority. Or maybe it's more widespread but in a more moderate and tacit form. I need to watch out for when I slip into it occasionally.</div><div><br /></div><div>Obviously it leaves a deeper impression on me because I started on the opposite side of the alleged chasm. Plus, I regularly interact with people who are "there" now. I'm motivated to mark our differences using more levels of contrast. I and a lot of other apostates know that we ourselves once <i>appeared</i> to live for a prolonged period on the old side even as we concealed our shifting sympathies and embryonic doubts. If there were a chasm, then aspects of us were already halfway over it, which led to us feeling like we were the odd ones.<br /><br />Admittedly, there are significant numbers who haven't ever had these internal struggles to a comparable degree. Their entire selves are casually intertwined with one side. No part of them is receptive to alternatives. Staying put is as involuntary and vital as breathing. They themselves may be openly unconcerned by the prospect of chasms between them and other subcultures—they may insist on it. ("We take for granted that we're on the right track if we think and act <i>nothing like</i> <i>you</i>.") I can see how being around them often enough would entrench a chasm mindset.<br /><br />Then there are the somewhat innocuous believers whose supernatural perspectives are fluid/informal, or fragmentary/unassuming, or almost totally irrelevant to their lives, or constructed by them from out of the miscellaneous sparkly bits of more complete beliefs. Each of their <i>concrete</i> opinions and values, evaluated purely <i>in isolation</i>, might bear a closer resemblance to the people who are said to be across a chasm from them, than to the radical believers whom they are said to belong with. They're strong candidates for joining together in causes in common.<br /><br />Broadly speaking, I don't find it sufficient to represent a wildly varied assortment of views and people with the repugnant examples alone. I'd prefer constant acknowledgment of the challenge of making summary judgments about all the diverse paths people take to deviate from materialistic naturalism. The majority of these paths are (or derive from) the abundant products of unrestricted group-facilitated creativity, socially reinforced and embellished for generation after generation. In fact, it's difficult to validly address a solitary subcategory, Abrahamic beliefs and believers, without first imposing narrower conditions on <i>which segments</i>&nbsp;are being addressed.<br /><br />I should clarify that my wish for fewer prejudicial generalizations is more about style than content. I'm not reversing my <i>position</i>&nbsp;about the other side's inaccurate notions. An error or misdeed can be called what it is. And although I'm maintaining that <i>not</i>&nbsp;<i>all</i>&nbsp;of my dissimilarities from <i>all</i> of that side's occupants are wide as chasms...I'd say an important gap <i>does </i>set the sides apart. In my reckoning, two attributes pinpoint the definitive disparity between Us and Them.<br /><br />The first attribute is <i>wary but expansive curiosity</i>. This species of curiosity reaches out to a sweeping extent of well-grounded information. It's the willingness and hunger to draw from any source that has clear-cut credence. It's not unfiltered absorption of baseless speculation or hearsay. It's considering unlikable information without immediately rejecting it and considering likable information without immediately pronouncing it legitimate.<br /><br />The second attribute is <i>conscientious introspective honesty</i>. This species of honesty is shown by persistently weighing the worthiness of personal thoughts, <i>especially</i>&nbsp;when the thought is dearly held. Honesty, e.g. not looking away, is essential twice: honestly examining thoughts below the superficial layers, then honestly grappling with the authentic evaluation. Depending on the person and the circumstances, they may not heed this attribute's tough demands until they're presented with the chance multiple times.<br /><br />The details make the difference. I'm not proposing that curiosity and honesty are foreign to Them, only these precise <i>forms.</i>&nbsp;Or, as it was with me in the past, these forms could be operating in deceptively restrained states. In Them, expansive curiosity is prevented from being <i>too</i> expansive. Honest introspection is conscientiously carried out but not <i>too</i>&nbsp;conscientiously. Boundaries surround the safe territory. Some commonplace questions have whole sets of rote replies. They serve as tolerable escape valves for the inner tensions caused by nagging doubts. But unanticipated questions that cut too deeply are taboo—and some radical replies to the&nbsp;<i>permitted</i> questions are taboo.<br /><br />Labeling such people on the side of Them isn't a shocking consequence of a rule that strictly ties the gap-not-chasm to the two attributes. But I'm fully aware that it relabels another group entirely: people who may agree with a great deal. The gap that's more meaningful to me is <i>how</i> conclusions are obtained, not on the conclusions. Concurring with me on selected subjects isn't <i>quite</i> enough evidence that we think alike.<br /><br />It can't be assumed that the two decisive attributes are appreciated by someone who by chance has never been steered toward supernatural stances, or was actively steered away by the pressure of their in-groups. Their <i>distaste</i>&nbsp;for particular ideas may be as externally guided ("cultural") as my bygone loyalties to the exact same ideas. Or maybe they were pleased to drop the ideas because their disposition is inclined to be contrarian, nontraditional, or rebellious. Or maybe they were driven out by uncaring treatment and senseless prohibitions. These reasons and personal journeys aren't <i>automatic</i> disqualifications; if they still have the attributes I'm looking for then they're fine in my outlook. If not...they probably have my support anyway, but my ability to relate to them will be reduced.<br /><br />Additionally, whenever people have followed unsystematic routes to proper conclusions, the chances are higher that they'll follow those routes to <i>improper</i> conclusions regarding other topics. Experience shows people's surprising ingenuity at harmonizing a "right" answer with plenty of "wrong" answers: examples abound in political discussions. To be correct about ____ isn't to gain universal immunity from error. As I've read again and again, if every religion vanished then people would fill the vacuum with poorly grounded beliefs of other kinds such as conspiracy theories and pseudo-medicines. Every day, lots of nonreligious people unfortunately fulfill this trite rule of thumb. (It deserves reiterating that this predicament isn't an excuse to decrease skeptical criticism of many types of religion. The excellent reason why these targets have been&nbsp;<i>more frequently</i>&nbsp;hit is that these beliefs have been more methodically spread, embedded, handed excessive power, and involved in one way or another with awful dehumanizing ethics.)<br /><br />Yet the potential shades of gray don't stop here either. Time can be a factor. Attributes aren't necessarily permanent but are demonstrated anew by the <i>ongoing</i> project of reapplying them. They could wax and wane. Or they could be impaired by individualized blind spots. Someone can <i>unintentionally</i> fail to engage their curiosity as much as they could have or honestly pay as close attention to the underpinnings of their thoughts as they could have. The lesson is that <i>sometimes</i> there barely is a gap at all between the quality of justifications employed by Us and Them...much less a chasm between people whose brain functions have and haven't "ascended" to a superior enlightened plane. We remain <i>Homo sapiens</i> aspiring to possess the most accurate ideas we can find.</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-65116128286390805482017-02-13T13:53:00.002-05:002017-02-13T13:53:51.534-05:00android deluge<a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2016/09/the-emerging-backfire.html" target="_blank">Months ago I recalled</a> an obscure catalyst of my gradual de-conversion: wrestling with the arguments of the "emerging church". But I recall another one too that isn't usually featured in de-conversion stories. My hazy thinking was prodded forward by a deluge of <i>androids</i>. I'm referring to machines intended to exhibit a gamut of person-like characteristics, from appearance to creativity to desire. At the time in 2008, the specific instances with the greatest prominence to me were in <i>Battlestar Galactica (2004)</i> and <i>Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles</i>. These two aren't uniquely important—obviously so, given that they were revivals of decades-old creations. The deluge of androids started in fiction <i>long</i> before these two. And it certainly has continued since, across a variety of media. By my estimate it's not lessening in strength...<br /><br />It hardly needs saying that I'm not claiming that imaginary android characters <i>proved or disproved</i> anything. The critical factor they contributed was to broaden and direct imagination. They implicitly and explicitly highlighted the standard philosophical thought-experiments. "If an android were sufficiently advanced in its duplication of human thought and behavior, would its 'mind' be like ours? If not, why not? Is there a coherent reason why it becoming sufficiently advanced is <i>impossible</i>?"&nbsp;Some of these questions have been connected to "zombies" instead of androids, but the gist is the same.<br /><br />As the unreal androids kept nagging me with the questions, my reading was providing me with corresponding answers. I was busy digesting two well-grounded premises, each of which are routinely confirmed. First, the <i>elemental</i> <i>ingredients</i> of humans are no different from the elemental ingredients of non-human stuff. The human form's distinctiveness arises from intricate combinations of the ingredients at coarser levels and from the activity those combinations engage in. Second, like I said in the preceding blog entry, information is encoded in <i>discrete arrangements</i> of matter (and/or energy flows). Ergo the details of the matter used in the arrangement aren't relevant except for obligatory requirements on its consistency and persistence. Information is perpetually copied/translated/transformed from one arrangement of matter to another. DNA molecules house information without having consciousness. The ramification of fusing the two premises is that because hypothetical androids are made of matter like people are, they're <i>capable</i> of manipulating information like people. This doesn't imply that it'll be <i>easy</i> to construct androids that encode information with comparable subtlety.<br /><br />To admit this much is to invite the next epiphany. The perspective is reversible. If they're enough like us, then we're like them. Presuming that androids' intellects&nbsp;can function as artificial variations of people's intellects, couldn't someone with a twisted mentality—a sufficiently advanced android maybe—regard people as the original biological templates <i>for androids</i>? Calling the suggestion <i>dehumanizing</i>&nbsp;misses the point. Being a "conscious machine" all along, constructed from cells in place of gizmos, doesn't subtract from our <i>subjective</i> experience one bit. The experience of freedom is accessible to <a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2008/08/tale-of-self-virtualizing-robot.html" target="_blank">self-virtualizing robots</a>.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-5962952100486053232017-02-11T15:16:00.002-05:002017-02-11T15:16:17.477-05:00convergenceLast time, inspired by Sean Carroll's big picture look at philosophy, I repeated the big picture which I've expressed here before. As described by information theory, ideas in the loosest sense are symbolic arrangements of matter and energy flows. Brain matter has evolved accordingly to act as a flexible channel for the reception, assembly, modification, and storage of ideas.<br /><br />Countless energy-consuming actions in the brain&nbsp;<i>link&nbsp;</i>ideas together. The links enable the ideas to be "hints" for one another. I'm not the first to suggest the analogy of a crossword puzzle. Each's answer's written clues might be vague, but the <i>intersections</i> of the words are crucial clues too. A strongly certain answer reinforces (or negates) the correctness of the answers that reuse its squares. The importance of context shouldn't be underestimated.<br /><div><br /></div><div>Through these linking actions, people will inevitably identify some linked ideas, <i>endpoints</i>, which <i>should</i> be relevant in <i>some</i> way to external actions.&nbsp;By "external" I merely mean that the actions don't happen solely inside the brain. The absorption of information via eyes and ears would be enough to qualify. Actions lead to outcomes, and outcomes are deeply affected by realities. Afterward, people can judge the level of agreement between the outcomes and the endpoints. But this isn't the whole effect. Based on the already mentioned links, their revised judgments of the endpoints' accuracy <i>should</i> revise their judgments of the linked ideas' accuracy. Ideas, actions, and outcomes are shaped by a triangle of mutual relationships.<br /><div><br /></div><div>I recognize that this big picture will provoke complaints. It grants a disappointingly <i>mundane</i> status to ideas and then it pairs this demotion with a sizable role for error-prone people. Wouldn't it be preferable if ideas were said to be unchanging and independent? That way, at least a few ideas exist "out there" by themselves, apart from relying on squishy, messy humans. This alternative is to insist that ideas are&nbsp;<i>sturdy things</i>.&nbsp;</div><div><br /></div><div>My view is that the sturdy-thing notion of ideas <i>does</i> have a diminished counterpart...but only through accepting a subtle redefinition. Instead of an idea having a quality of sturdiness, it can be evaluated by the number and intensity of the&nbsp;<i>convergences&nbsp;</i>it's involved in with other ideas. When a swarm of small easily-checked endpoint ideas have been tested as highly accurate (facts), and all these align well with a single general idea, it's like these ideas are converging on the single idea. The single idea represents a valuable summary, trend, or explanation. Brain actions such as deduction might produce convergences as well: if several axioms and proofs yield a single idea, then it's a valuable theorem. The ultimate result, after tallying an idea's convergences, is to situate it on a relative continuum. A hub idea involved in a multitude of convergences of various kinds is precious. But an isolated idea that's <i>diverged from</i> is suspect.&nbsp;</div></div><div><br /></div><div>Unfortunately, raw convergence isn't irrefutable. It carries its own inherent risk: it isn't necessarily universal. Its scope is possibly limited, even when it's quite dominant for ideas in its scope. Survey responses gathered in Connecticut could converge to an idea, but it might differ nonetheless from the idea that survey responses gathered in British Columbia converge to. Paying close attention to scope is just a price of replacing sturdy-thing ideas with convergent ideas.</div><div><br /></div><div>But before fixating on the perceived inadequacies of ranking ideas by convergence, my advice is to methodically take an inventory of what it gives up by comparison. An idea that has been converged to many times, in many ways, is an idea that is very likely to be converged on once more. So it's probably beneficial for planning on the outcome of <i>future</i> actions. An idea that hasn't contradicted high-quality ideas is an idea that is very likely to not flatly contradict <i>additional</i> high-quality ideas. So it's probably beneficial as a lens for comprehending proposed ideas. An idea that has succinctly captured the pertinent similarities in a series of repetitive events is an idea that is very likely to echo the pertinent similarities in <i>upcoming</i> events in the series. So it's probably beneficial as a prediction or model of hypothetical events in its scope.<br /><br />I'd say that the list of drawbacks is looking insignificant. For most purposes, a heavily convergent idea and a sturdy-thing idea are alike. The reason is that convergence is part of the original concept of a sturdy-thing idea <i>in practice</i>. On the assumption that an idea itself is a sturdy thing, then ideas/actions/outcomes would be expected to converge on it. The difference is whether convergence is interpreted as secondary to the idea or interpreted as defining its actual extent. Particular actions can't distinguish between the two interpretations. Perhaps the situation is reminiscent of a (positive) bank account balance. The account's owner can take the action of withdrawing currency from the bank account no matter what the account "really" consists of. For withdrawals the bank account is <i>like</i> a stack of currency in a locked drawer—although the equivalency doesn't work at a failing bank.<br /><br />The prospect of agreeing to humble ideas could spur the forgivable question, "If not ideas, then <i>what is</i> considered sturdy?" And the answer is lots and lots of real stuff. The milk in my refrigerator is a sturdy thing. My <i>idea</i> that the milk has soured isn't. This idea is linked to the endpoint idea that in the near future I open the milk container, hold it close to my nostrils, inhale deeply, and experience a sensation of odor. The idea of the sour milk is linked to more endpoint ideas such as requesting that someone else sniff so I can watch their reactions. Depending on the outcomes of these endpoints, the idea of the sour milk might be a convergent idea or not. The milk's reality is gratifyingly sturdy. It affects the amount of convergence which my ideas about it have. The same may be asserted about a more "existential" idea about the milk: is it <i>still in</i> the refrigerator, or did some obnoxious household member empty it without telling me? My ideas about the milk, presently occurring in my brain, don't dictate whether the milk is now elsewhere. The actions I take won't imply that I'm finding the <i>idea</i> that the milk is elsewhere but that I'm thinking the ideas associated with realizing that I'm not finding the milk.<br /><br />If ideas regarding soured milk seem far too frivolous, Sean Carroll's writing contains a fitting candidate which is definitely not. His "Core Theory" is an <i>immensely</i> convergent collection of ideas. Moreover, as he painstakingly explains, its confirmed scope is <i>immensely</i> broad. People's typical lives are within it. In effect researchers and engineers are rechecking it repeatedly as they act. It's not a sturdy thing...but nonetheless we're metaphorically leaning on it all the time.</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-56225765736532145942017-01-28T16:26:00.003-05:002017-01-28T16:26:49.964-05:00swapping picturesIt's a bottomless source of ironic amusement that intellectual justifications for religious beliefs usually appeal most to the beliefs'&nbsp;<i>current adherents</i>. They relish hearing their cherished ideas defended and reconfirmed by multitalented communicators. And...I suppose I do too. That's probably why I took the time to read Sean Carroll's <i>The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself</i>&nbsp;and enjoyed most of it. I wish it all the popular or critical success that it can get.<br /><br />With that in mind, it's no surprise that the book's major points weren't that groundbreaking or earth-shattering to me. His Big Picture is in harmony with mine. Nevertheless I appreciated Carroll's articulate and organized delivery as well as the specifics he laid out. I already knew about some of these supporting details and arguments—it's not my first exposure to these topics—but I learned some too. Obviously he can apply more physics knowledge to the Big Picture than I can, similar to how a neuroscientist can apply more neuroscience knowledge, or a philosopher can apply more philosophy.<br /><br />As I see it, his model of "poetic naturalism" is consistent with my (poorly-named) "Pragmatism-ish". He proposes that there are diverse ways of conceptualizing reality. This diversity should be accepted but&nbsp;<i>only on the overriding condition</i> that each one can be mapped onto another without contradiction. Throughout these ways, ideas should be gauged with likelihoods that adjust appropriately as more samples of reality are taken. Likelihoods that aren't inherently 0 (logical impossibility) or 100% (logical certitude) shouldn't reach these extremes, yet likelihoods can and do reach values that are close to either pole.<br /><br />Likewise in Pragmatism-ish, I've proposed that ideas, actions, and reality are in a triangle of relationships. Each of the three shapes/restricts/informs the other two. (I'm using the word "idea" in the most inclusive sense, so it might be a perception, concept, statement, hypothesis...) People perform the mental action of determining that if an idea A is likelier than not then idea B is likelier than not, if idea B is likelier than not then idea C is likelier than not, etc. These connections form a web (or network) of ideas. Eventually the web extends to ideas which may be termed "endpoints": ideas that should be expected to, with a particular frequency, match particular outcomes of particular actions really performed.<br /><br />Once people verify these matches, or fail to, they can take the further action of judging what some of the ideas in the web&nbsp;<i>mean</i> as well as the ideas' <i>accuracy</i>. To probe a supposedly meaningful and accurate idea is to question <i>how it's ultimately grounded.</i>&nbsp;What is it connected to within the web, and what relevant endpoints have passed or failed fair tests? I've sometimes referred to measuring an idea's meaning by its "verified implications". A folksy version, which is so short that it's vulnerable to numerous willful misunderstandings, is that truth needs to works for a living.<br /><br />Like Carroll, I would say that ideas containing an element of subjective experience can be valid as long as those ideas are kept in their correct place in the web alongside other more objective ideas. Then the limitation of subjective experiences is always evident: the experiences are events that happened in one subject's body (including their brain). The idea is still an expression of something real if it's understood to occur as a movement of the matter in that body.<br /><br />Complexity is inevitable when the sifting process is conducted with the proper care and labor. There are many possible cases. Ideas with "tighter" connections to verified endpoint ideas merit more confidence than ideas with looser connections. On the flipside, ideas with no connections merit little. These freestanding ideas, which may be "freestanding" from the rest of the web <i>because</i> they blatantly clash with well-grounded ideas, are like when Carroll's statements in one domain don't map onto other domains. Another case is that an idea has meager meaningfulness because it connects&nbsp;<i>equally</i> well with opposite outcomes, so that in effect it's asserting nothing of consequence. Then there's the case of multiple different ideas connecting to the same endpoints, so that there's some rationale for claiming that the ideas share a meaning. Skilled translators watch for this kind of subtlety.<br /><br />The abstraction of a web of ideas has a resemblance to Carroll's vivid "planets of belief". I admire his metaphor. It should be spread. The suggestion is that, within an intellectually honest curious person, compatible beliefs gravitate together to form a planet. Combining incompatible beliefs results in a tension-filled unstable planet. Outside influences can affect the planet's stability causing chain reactions and tectonic rearrangements. Under some circumstances, it can be prodded into breaking apart and reforming into a novel planet.<br /><br />Some could object that Carroll ventured too far outside of his designated area, and he should've left topics beyond physics alone. My response would be that his readers should know better than to assume that he or anyone is able to cover the Big Picture <i>comprehensively</i> in so few pages. By necessity it's an overview or a taxonomy. Readers with greater interest will be doing their own follow-up reading anyway.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-57036213103323072932017-01-08T14:04:00.002-05:002017-01-08T14:04:31.889-05:00opposing forces<b>Barnabas:</b>&nbsp;If you don't mind, I'd like to jump now into the real purpose of my visit. I've heard about the...unusual ideas you've been spreading around.<br /><b>Kyle:</b>&nbsp;The Jedi Way.<br /><b>B:</b> Have you thought about how it compares to Christianity? Why does the Jedi Way make more sense to you?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;It just does. I could argue for it using most of the arguments that you might have for Christianity's believability.<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;Doesn't it bother you that the stories behind the Jedi Way are fictional?<br /><b>K:</b> The amount of fiction in the Bible hasn't been a fatal problem for Christianity. I know there's been a ton of debate about how much of the Bible is factual or how much of it is metaphorical myths. What if the writers of the stories behind the Jedi Way were still "inspired" by the Force to insert <i>certain ideas</i>, even if they themselves thought they were writing fiction alone? &nbsp;And neither of us were there when the events took place. Who are we to say that none of it took place, and not in any form? Maybe the stories contain some exaggerations and mistakes, but the events are told accurately, by and large.<br /><b>B:&nbsp;</b>Okay, then put aside whether the little details are fiction and stick to the major ideas. Lots of people have observed striking similarities to isolated elements of Taoism and Buddhism. Isn't the lack of originality suspicious?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;No, it fits the typical pattern. Religions come about as offshoots of other religions. Each one takes cues from precedent. Do I even need to bring up Christianity's origin—<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;Look, be reasonable, the stories we're discussing are full of mystical powers. Why aren't all the believers of the Jedi Way showing these off?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;Maybe the flashy powers were intended only for that time period. And maybe we don't have the same kind of effective belief that the people in the story did. The figures in the stories demonstrate that it's not necessary to have superhuman abilities in order to trust in the Force, be mutual allies with it, and refer to it in conversation.<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;If the Jedi Way is more true, why isn't it believed in by more people? I mean, compared to Christianity?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;Popularity isn't an absolute proof. Worldwide, Christianity is claimed by less than half. Obviously there are countries all over the world in which the majority belief isn't Christianity. Christians must agree with me that culture and social pressure can be used to make "false" beliefs dominant.<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;Okay, but the Jedi Way group is so tiny that there isn't any official authority over it. Who decides what it is? Isn't it up to personal whim and invention?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;It's based on the stories we already mentioned. It doesn't have an "official" authority, but Christianity doesn't have an "official" authority either. <i>All</i> of the traditional global religions are divided up into bits and pieces, and the bits and pieces have separate conflicting authorities. There may be one Bible, but there's constant fighting over how to interpret it, and over which parts are important.<br /><b>B:</b> Here's something: "one Bible", you said. The Bible is the Bible because of a deliberate process that canonized some documents but pronounced others to be heretical. Who decides which stories to refer to in the Jedi Way?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;There are canon rules. I won't bore you with the details. But the point is that not every story that's ever been published is of equal rank in the canon. Some stories override others. Reconciling <i>apparent</i> contradictions is treated like a pastime. And again like the Bible, certain ideas <i>within</i> a canon story still lead to puzzles and controversy anyway. So-called "midi-chlorians"...<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;You're implying that a huge authoritative role is being played by corporations. Their primary goals are profit-seeking and self-preservation. That's unsatisfying, isn't it?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;As a Christian, I'm guessing that you're not purely bothered by massive organizations with rich budgets. Or by the buying and selling of related merchandise. The conscious goal of an organization doesn't need to be the Jedi Way—like how I said earlier that the conscious goal of the story writers didn't need to be non-fiction. If we seriously believe that the Force is supreme, then the Force can use organizations to serve its purpose, no matter what the organization is pursuing. Christians say the same about God's usage of the actions of unbelievers. Also, to reiterate, of course no authority is able to dictate what every individual believes about the Jedi Way. Consider how often individual Christians loudly disagree with the rulings made by the supposed "hierarchies" over them.<br /><b>B:</b> Wouldn't you say that a few important subjects are overlooked, though? What is there for you to assert about ethics?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;The ethical code preaches compassion, peace, knowledge, democracy, mediation, the greater good, wise judgment. The broad principles aren't unique to Christianity. And Christians differ about the best applications of their principles. They argue about what a "real" Christian should act like. Someone who sees their ethics as rooted in the Jedi Way is no worse off.<br /><b>B:</b> What hope would you offer to someone who's worried about their past evil actions? What does someone do to improve themselves? Why would they?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;There's a light path and a dark path, and we have light and dark sides in us too. The dark is quicker and easier and unreflective, but the light is evident when someone looks more calmly at the big picture. The light is chosen because it's the light.<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;So I should assume no rewards in an afterlife? No afterlife whatsoever?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;Under normal circumstances, nobody lives forever. They return to something grander than their bodies: the Force. Anyone who lives past death only does it as part of the Force itself. This shouldn't be thought of as scary. Life and the Force are bound together. It's like coming home. Personal identity is meant to end eventually.<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;That brings up something else. Isn't there a soul?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;Yes, there are souls. There's more to the universe than crude matter. Souls are bound to the Force like life is, and souls can receive whisper-like intuitions of guidance. Some feel this more than others.<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;I'll admit that believers like you may feel something, but they're in error about what they feel.<br /><b>K:</b> No, I think you will find that it is you who are mistaken. People with various beliefs feel the existence of something colossal beyond their everyday experiences. Some are Christian, many are not, and a few are sympathetic to the Jedi Way. In any case, these feelings don't prove a single viewpoint above the rest. I could as easily say that a big gathering of Christians, working together, kindles the movement of the Force. Or that the Force may be strong in specific sacred locations.<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;Well then, focus on other personal experiences of God's power. Unexplained medical recoveries, highly suggestive coincidences, sudden rescues, surprise acts of needed charity, and on and on.<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;I don't know if you realize this, but Christians tend to be the only ones who think those occurrences are convincing enough. If we're saying that there's a hidden cause coming to our aid, why couldn't it be the Force, not the Christian God? What would you say about the times that I ask the Force for help, and then something good happens?<br /><b>B:</b>&nbsp;I seem to be wasting my time here. You know, in the end, doesn't your set of beliefs appear...um...hokey?<br /><b>K:</b>&nbsp;Sitting on the other side from you, let me reply that the appearance of hokeyness depends greatly on a certain point of view.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-53516918074460698292016-12-18T11:24:00.002-05:002016-12-18T11:24:40.061-05:00nonessential symbols on 34th streetLike so many, I have a habit of watching <i>Miracle on 34th Street</i>&nbsp;(1947). This is the charming, humorous movie in which a man in New York acts like, speaks like, and describes himself as, Santa Claus. (He always gives his name as Kris Kringle.) This premise is played with in both innocent and cynical ways. Characters respond to Kris according to their differing motivations...and often with full concern about the <i>publicity</i> of their responses.<br /><br />This time I noticed something new in a particular conversation. Doris Walker, who hired Kris to be her store Santa, is trying to deter her romantic interest, defense attorney Fred Gailey, from ruining his respectable career. Fred is attempting in court to keep Kris from being forcibly committed to asylum—but he's recklessly decided to do it by arguing that his client is <i>correct</i>&nbsp;to think that he is Santa.<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq"><b>Fred</b>: You don't have any faith in me, do you?<br /><b>Doris</b>: It's not a question of faith. It's just common sense.<br /><b>Fred</b>: Faith is believing in things when common sense tells you not to. Don't you see? It's not just Kris that's on trial. It's everything he stands for. It's kindness and joy and love and all the other intangibles.<br /><b>Doris</b>: Oh Fred, you're talking like a child. You're living in a realistic world. And those lovely intangibles of yours are attractive but not worth very much.<br />[...later same scene...]<br /><b>Fred</b>: Some day, you're going to find out that your way of facing this realistic world just doesn't work. And when you do, don't overlook those lovely intangibles. You'll discover they're the only things that are worthwhile.</blockquote>During the earlier religious phase of my life, I might have reflexively cheered Fred's mere mentioning of "intangibles"—crucial values. My former religion preached the superiority of similar spiritual goods such as virtues and meaningful living and a quality soul. Along with that I might have caricatured Doris as a pitiful personification of too much dull focus on earthly concerns. To some extent, especially near the beginning, Doris' lines evoke this caricature.<br /><br />Now, though, I can't help noticing the&nbsp;<i>sly tactic </i>of melding Kris to intangibles. It seems to me that Doris could've parried it. "Oh Fred, I'm in favor of your intangibles as much as you are. I just don't think that those depend in any way on what you decide about Kris or about this trial. But your future livelihood might." Their genuine disagreement is over what actions are practical to take toward moral goals, not over <i>whether</i> moral goals exist and should inform actions. Safeguarding Kris' freedom of movement at any cost isn't as imperative if he's more like a <i>nonessential symbol</i> of the precious intangibles than a supporting pillar.<br /><br />To the quixotic Fred, the thought of declining to sacrifice himself for this specific nonessential symbol may be equivalent to declining to sacrifice himself for everything that's right. But that doesn't necessarily imply Doris' concepts of intangibles have the same equivalency with the same nonessential symbol. Likewise, the past religious version of me could've raised this objection. That version wouldn't have accepted that mine and Fred's shared appreciation of intangibles required me to embrace and defend his nonessential symbol too. In fact, I would've strongly <i>insisted</i> that my beliefs in intangibles were perfectly complete without an earnest belief in Kris Kringle. And then maybe I would've countered that the <i>really</i> essential symbols were my own of course, i.e. the ones within my religion.<br /><br />Naturally, the tactic's relevance to my past self wasn't primarily why it grabbed my attention recently. It has relevance to me currently as well. More than I would like, it's analogous to the overdramatized reactions which confront boosters of materialistic naturalism. Our dissent, not from kindly Santa but from cherished supernatural figures, is promptly reinterpreted as wide-ranging dissent from every important cultural value there is. This is unfair to us because we certainly have numerous ethical principles; we're only classifying the conventional supernatural figures as nonessential (or highly misleading...) symbols of them. In our view they're as nonessential to fortifying the ethical principles that matter as the movie character Kris is nonessential to fortifying the everyday intangibles of a religious person watching a pleasant movie.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-15044975259069426462016-09-18T11:00:00.002-04:002016-09-18T11:00:11.608-04:00levelheadednessWhen I look back, I'm endlessly amused by the striking differences in&nbsp;my entire set of intellectual sympathies. I get the sense that I'm now someone else than I was in the past—but of course the passage of time already <i>implies that</i>&nbsp;<i>I am</i>, and so is everyone else. As always, the differences show up through a common reference point.<br /><div><br /></div><div>One of the divisive questions that triggers a new reflexive response in me is, "How can an atom be enough to give rise to subjective experience?" A <i>previous</i> version of me regarded this as an excellent argument to stump the disciples of materialistic naturalism. Today, I regard it as too misguided and narrow to have a simple answer. Faulty, messy preconceptions are dissolved in it. It's a symptom of confusion not purely about the essential complexity of subjective experience but also about the boundaries of&nbsp;<i>conceptual levels</i>.</div><div><br /></div><div>I know I can't speak for everyone who's superficially, or even thoroughly, on my "side". Be that as it may, I've noticed that "we" tend to endorse conceptual levels as alternatives to soul/reality dualism(s). The whole gamut of subjective experiences, which I enjoy mislabeling "mentality" for short (take that, dictionaries), inhabits a conceptual level different from the conceptual level inhabited by the atoms in the question. Mentality isn't a delusion, but neither does it exist as a disparate&nbsp;<i>kind</i> of core reality. It functions as a category that's useful for <i>thinking about</i>&nbsp;some phenomena. This category is apparent at practical scales, where it's more like an average or a summarization of other levels. The items in the mentality level aren't existing&nbsp;<i>apart</i>, because the underlying <i>stuff</i> within all the levels is the same. The levels are like a set of various lenses for studying the stuff.<br /><br />Fortunately, this picture has numerous familiar precedents and counterparts: weather is one of my favorites. Water droplets are everywhere in the air, floating, moving, and interacting. Yet it's unusual to hear the question "How could a droplet be enough to give rise to a cyclone?" posed as a <i>philosophical</i> puzzle or to hear the suggestion that a cyclone is the sign of something uncanny residing in, and psychically directing, masses of droplets. (Although&nbsp;<i>elemental</i> spirits have arisen time after time in culture.) A cyclone isn't said to be&nbsp;<i>present</i> <i>in each</i> of the droplets in its interior. It's understood to be a sizable grouping of swirling masses of droplet-containing air. It doesn't stop being a cyclone because individual droplets would be seen under great magnification. The conceptual level of droplets happens to be unfeasible for, say, predicting where the cyclone is headed or how much longer it will persist; there are too many droplets and too many effects occurring simultaneously among them. This is partly why cyclones are hard to decipher. The greater ease of analyzing the cyclone at another conceptual level doesn't force the belief that it's a mysterious manifestation from unknown sources.<br /><br />This is a tidy arrangement to apply to questions about mentality. Mentality's conceptual level is like the cyclone's, and the atom's is like the droplet's. An initial obstacle to accepting this is that mentality doesn't always <i>appear</i> to be as complex as the cyclone. And on occasion it appears to be disconnected from the rest of reality. These impressions are deceptive. Upon steady investigation, either indirectly through modern technologically-aided observation, or directly through meditative introspection, mentality's façade of simplicity consistently evaporates. During many usual conditions, it's a bubbling stew of sensations, emotions, cogitations, wishes, simulations. The nervous system's work to keep it going and feed it continual information is considerable. Nerves extend to the body's very edges and in total consume energy at a high rate. Other creatures have been shown to have <i>some</i> of the characteristics of mentality, which is one more hint that the human variant is a <i>collection</i> of abilities as opposed to a single capacity. The result is that <i>we shouldn't expect</i>&nbsp;a trifling number of aloof atoms to produce and fill mentality. But we should expect to discover what we have: complex outputs corresponding to a complex throng of coordinated components, analyzable at multiple conceptual levels. The project to better trace the specific workings is still in progress, but knowledge is only increasing about the distinctive roles of portions of the brain, for instance.<br /><br />And yet, reflecting on this "cyclonic" metaphor might hit a second obstacle. Granting that mentality is an aggregate <i>effect</i> doesn't explain the appearances of it acting as a <i>cause</i>. Some of its prominent manifestations are obsessions of varying intensities including addiction. How can they be in the level of mentality and be so <i>influential</i>&nbsp;too? To be dominant and persistent, they must be causing real changes. Their <i>felt</i> importance must be coupled to material importance on other levels. The features of present/past mentality must in some way act as causes of features of future mentality.<br /><br />As I see it, like the first, this second obstacle is less of a problem after a closer look. A cooperative formation of low-level components <i>certainly does </i>have the potential to provoke an occurrence which is observable at a higher level, and then this occurrence in turn has its own effects that provoke changes back in the components in formation. Actually, this abstract pattern is <i>indispensable</i>&nbsp;in plenty of contexts. The humble thermostat inevitably gets drawn into this topic, as probably the quintessential example. <i>Low-level</i> materials inside it detect shifts in the temperature of its environment. It ends up activating or deactivating the <i>high-level</i> heating or cooling facilities of the environment. Eventually when the environment's temperature shifts again, the thermostat detects the new shift and performs a different action. The thermostat's low-level materials affect, then are affected by, the high-level environment's temperature.<br /><br />The comparison is very limited in its usefulness. Mentality is more subtle and quick than a thermostat—though body temperature regulation is part of it and extreme temperatures disturb mood. The relevant similarity is that the low-level components of mentality, such as neurons (and all the neuron segments, and all the molecules in the segments, and all the atoms in the molecules...), work together to assemble a breathtaking overall product, and <i>in the process</i>&nbsp;sway low-level components as well. So mentality doesn't exude a peculiar, extra, general-purpose force which is capable of inhabiting and directing "nearby" substances. Solely because <i>it is the group behavior</i> of low-level components, it's capable of manipulating them or their peers.<br /><br />This is plausible if there's already a suspicion that the components' behavior has the side effect of altering themselves. Perhaps an exchange between them spurs small adaptations <i>in both</i> the sender and the receiver: they grow "closer", i.e. more apt to repeat the exchange. Thus the mental activity of obsession itself "rewires" a creature in such a way that the obsessive thoughts are more likely to return. Thinking habits matter...and thinking habituates matter.</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-49390894234694009782016-09-02T20:01:00.001-04:002016-09-02T20:01:06.849-04:00the emerging backfireI went through several stages as I ejected the poorly grounded ideas of my upbringing. Despite the gaps in-between, each stage encouraged the next. The whole progression had its own momentum like an inevitable chain reaction. To make this comparison is to invite the question of this reaction's <i>catalysts</i>. However, many of my catalysts aren't unique. Others have already been explained these over and over. Since I began looking around the internet, reading related books, etc., I've been reassured that I'm part of a sizable category of American adults who've walked the same path out of their outdated beliefs, seen the same information, been in a few of the same experiences, found the same flaws. This category isn't really <i>new</i>, but it's more visible than before.<br /><br />As I look back, though, I think I can claim a catalyst that's probably on the obscure end of the spectrum. I didn't have strong antagonism against argumentative atheists. I wasn't interested in them and I avoided them. My antagonism was against the fashionable&nbsp;<i>emerging church</i>&nbsp;subculture. This name is more than a little misleading to the uninformed, given it's (proudly) not an official church organization. It's closer to a loose aggregate of people, from a range of backgrounds, who share and spread similar views. They employ maddening pieces of philosophy to surgically extract, alter, and replace selected parts of old religious assertions. By self-indulgently modifying, or at least muddying, these unacceptable parts, they can obtain a creed (er, "spirituality") that's&nbsp;<i>viable</i>&nbsp;for them.<br /><br />Their popularity is in agreement with the trends of personalized consumer choices, the ability to spontaneously collaborate via the internet, distrust of big, coercive, "top-down" hierarchies, appreciation of smoothly blending complexities rather than oversimplified, all-or-nothing dichotomies, and the good intention of not granting unconditional authority to a lone source. They may or may not also consider themselves religiously unaffiliated; in <i>either</i> case they favor unusual descriptions. They're anxious to not be lumped together with average religionists. (Likelier than not they would feel that the term "emergent church" is too abstract and general to adequately capture the independence and specialness of their individual viewpoints.)<br /><br />This was intolerable. I was certain they must be far off track. They were questioning the conventionally understood ways of structuring and justifying my religion's tenets. To do this they were probing and dismantling the crucial premise that the tenets, as well as anything supporting these, symbolized&nbsp;<i>factual and unambiguous</i> meanings. For as long as the meanings were regarded as unstructured mush sculpted by the interpreting person (and indirectly the person's culture), then the meanings were open to endless revision. Furthermore, because they saw ideas as so malleable and difficult to circumscribe, oftentimes they hinted or plainly stated that the exhaustive details of what they believed barely mattered to them. To the contrary, the full role of religion was restricted to the promotion of basic human decency—excluding all behavioral rules that were too off-putting or contentious or narrow-minded.<br /><br />The effect was that I was pressed into rigidly insisting on the opposite: an ironclad, continuous line of meaningfulness. Everything was intertwined in my countering vision. It wasn't coherent to substitute any portion. The right actions flowed from the right thoughts. The right thoughts flowed from the right beliefs. The right beliefs flowed from the right understandings of the religion's underpinnings. And finally, these underpinnings were capable of <i>engendering</i> the right understandings, provided someone was pursuing the understandings&nbsp;<i>properly</i>&nbsp;(well-done "exegesis"), such as not inserting their "bias". Religious statements were really proposing real features of, and real actions taken by, real things. Accordingly, the statements had real consequences. The supernatural domain was out there, and it operated under the system of rules I subscribed to.<br /><br />I didn't perceive the corner I was backing into. I wished to soundly reject the emerging church's adaptations, preferably by establishing that these changes were neither valid nor necessary. In pursuit of that goal, I tacitly depended on the assumption of a superior alternative, namely the fixed target that was being missed. Therefore, I was assuming that the strict doctrines I'd been taught had an exceptional level of <i>accuracy and relevance</i>.<br /><br />...and yet, in the middle of this, I was starting to wonder. Did I know <i>for myself</i> whether my positions were trustworthy enough to be applied in this way? I was too scrupulous to be satisfied by a glib "We disagree so I'm sure you're wrong." I needed to examine the points submitted and identify <i>why and how</i> I was right instead. I sought to learn from the opposing outlook by <i>defeating</i>&nbsp;it. I wasn't keen on fearfully <i>dodging</i> its concerns.<br /><br />It turned out that my expectations were much too high. Like a new seminary student—but not nearly as dedicated or well-read—I slowly registered the ramifications of two facts. First, over my religion's recorded history, it had been shaken by successive debates about <i>its own core claims</i>. Second, these debates tended to recur; they were never permanently decided by clear-cut solutions reached through irresistible data and reasoning. I admitted that the emerging church's ramblings weren't completely unfounded. I'd inherited <i>one of many</i> end results from the old debates. I was accustomed to this synthesis, so it had appeared "obvious" to me.<br /><br />Ultimately, I was unable to marshal&nbsp;<i>anything indisputable</i>&nbsp;to elevate my particular set of religious claims. I couldn't do it through tight logic, in the style of a mathematical proof. I couldn't do it through referencing decisive observations, in the style of a controlled investigation or experiment. The remaining route was to argue in the manner of a, ahem, theologian: mash up some discrete strands of thoughts and sources, express a principle that seemed to be compatible with this mash, and exploit some analogies to convince others that the principle was literally&nbsp;<i>believable</i>. I could try to paint a convincing picture of my doctrines' relatively greater fidelity to the religion's main messages. But I couldn't be confident that I was communicating pristine truth. I couldn't escape the equivocal pattern of discourse, "On the one hand...on the other hand..."<br /><br />Earlier I wrote that this contrast acted as a single catalyst along the way. The emerging church's publications didn't <i>push</i> me out of my old identity or its ideological commitments. Their scribbles didn't purposely prepare me for my later conversion to materialistic naturalism. While I didn't embrace their notion of flexible meaning, their efforts nudged me to take a sincere inventory of what precisely my unbending meanings <i>were attached</i> to in the first place. Once I did, it became a steadily strengthening habit...Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-74899366491899609672016-08-29T08:57:00.002-04:002016-08-29T08:57:17.735-04:00hauntings of all kindsThe concoctions of homeopathy are seldom recommended by those who align themselves with materialistic naturalism. Uncontroversial chemistry and physics guarantee that these highly diluted doses <i>don't contain the slightest speck </i>of the original ingredients. So the sole possibility is that these ingredients have left behind an unspecified <i>aftereffect</i>, which persists and does medicinal work <i>without</i> the physical presence of the former ingredients' matter or energy. These incorporeal aftereffects are central to the products' effectiveness...yet no phenomena fitting these characteristics have ever been confirmed to exist. In general, this or any practical application of&nbsp;<i>incorporeal but locatable</i>&nbsp;stuff could be labelled a&nbsp;<i>haunting</i>.<br /><br />Unfortunately, not everyone commonly recognizes that the shakiness underlying this topic's reasoning has a multitude of <i>parallels</i>. There are proposed variations of hauntings in diverse contexts. Obviously, one is when the spirits of the deceased loiter in badly maintained historical houses. Another less grim context is the haunting of living creatures' bodies by life energy. Then there's a combination of these two referred to as possession: spirits of the deceased haunting living creatures' bodies without their consent. Or, the personal haunting might be invited and helpful, as in requesting a friendly, powerful thing to gently occupy, advise, and enhance the requester's own spirit. Maybe the haunting is of the interior of a place of worship, because its activity is inferred from the atypical communal behavior of a crowd during their worship rituals. Maybe the haunting is of objects that have been put through blessing/anointing/consecrating ceremonies. Like homeopathic products, the proposition is that these hauntings have undetectable active factors which are&nbsp;<i>distinct from</i>&nbsp;physical causes.<br /><br />Without a doubt, the foremost haunting of all is the <i>soul</i>—a category also including every&nbsp;<i>non-figurative</i> definition of "the mind". Souls are said to be intertwined with a person but not as something material inside them. This is analogous to the healing stuff intertwined with a homeopathic product but not as something material inside it. Souls are said to be normally confined to the person but cannot be pinpointed or interacted with using anything material. Similarly, the healing stuff in the homeopathic product is confined to the inner contents—a consumer must ingest the product—but the healing stuff cannot be pinpointed or interacted with using anything material. Souls are said to mysteriously encode and store bits of data without modifying states of matter. (This is a unique difference from the usual media of information encoding and storage.) Likewise, homeopathic products mysteriously remember the original ingredients without the use of lasting changes to the set of remaining molecules.<br /><br />The pitfall is that parallels are suggestive but not irrefutable. Ideas' resemblances don't <i>force</i> someone to treat them as a single class. The wonder of <i>compartmentalization</i>&nbsp;allows for rejecting the reality of some hauntings while defending others. Someone's preferred hauntings may seem utterly reasonable at the same time that an array of alternative hauntings "are just silly". Again through compartmentalization, it doesn't matter whether the <i>verification methods and results</i> that back their preferred hauntings are roughly comparable to the methods and results backing the disliked hauntings.<br /><br />An instantaneous change of mindset isn't the realistic, likely outcome when compartmentalization reigns. The moderate hope is to weaken it and compete with it: to tempt someone to freshly reexamine their previously accepted ideas with unflinching eyes. Pondering these ideas'&nbsp;<i>counterparts</i>&nbsp;might facilitate that. If an idea is in some sense like <i>that</i> one over there, how is it known to be more accurate than that one, i.e. better grounded?Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-69857328272359882572016-08-16T09:55:00.001-04:002016-08-16T09:55:08.959-04:00lackluster constancy<div>To the extent I was able, I chose to discard an entire web of poorly grounded ideas and related practices. But the reality is that I still occasionally encounter them, depending on circumstances outside my control. Within these encounters, I'm surprised by the many large changes in how I react now compared to then. I notice different features than I did, and I more swiftly notice these features' inadequacies. One that struck me recently was the monotonous preoccupation on <i>constancy</i>, whether the context is a song or a preferred passage from a text. It <i>never</i> does X, it <i>always</i> does Y, and its characteristic Z is timeless. A mystical being's quality of constancy is often repeated, elaborated, and praised. But from my <i>current</i> perspective, the manifestations of this quality appear lackluster at best. Its plausible interpretations don't amount to much:</div><div><ul><li>If the being's warm internal <i>feelings</i> for humanity are said to have excellent constancy, then the next question is immediately clear: "Yes, and...?" It's not too demanding to proceed to ask what the <i>expressions</i> of those feelings are. Constant feelings that don't <i>lead</i> to anything at all are as inconsequential as <i>wavering</i> feelings that don't lead to anything at all.</li><li>Or perhaps the constancy is seen concretely in innumerable cases of&nbsp;<i>prosaic</i> aid day after day. The issue is that minor beneficial events are apparent coincidences. Some could be expected to happen to <i>anyone</i> at proportional rates, regardless of their loyalties or rituals. The constancy, or semi-regularity, of these nice but slight&nbsp;<i>non-miracles</i>&nbsp;isn't that remarkable to a disinterested observer.</li><li>In a less concrete but still very meaningful direction, there could be constancy in the undercurrent of inspiration, encouragement, and determination. Throughout the problems in the life of the grateful devotee, they've been reassured and strengthened by their concept of their specific being. They might say that it's been alongside them, beckoning them forward, or even firmly pushing them to make improved decisions. This emotional support is understandably valuable. However, it's not <i>uniquely</i> valuable. A virtually unlimited set of concepts could do this in someone's head, although the concepts which would serve one person wouldn't necessarily serve another. A sophisticated "anchor" concept with some constancy in consciousness doesn't require that it represents something that, well, exists.</li><li>A less excusable version of abstract constancy is the <i>fossilization</i> of the whole concept in itself. It's <i>redundant</i> for a speaker to declare that a being "never changes" while they openly reject every potential <i>revision</i> to their very ideas about it. Admirably keeping the same form for eons is less of a feat when that's its <i>designated</i> nature. Its stagnation is an echo of the stubbornness of the person imagining it. It has constancy because they imagine it in a manner that has constancy.</li><li>Nobody will be shocked that I'm most appreciate of the interpretation of constancy that invokes mystical beings the least: the constancy of mutual human compassion and cooperation. There may be side comments that a being is operating through people's actions as if they're its tools, but one would hope that the people receive some gratitude too for their selflessness. Constancy of care, delivered again and again from person to person, is indeed a precious phenomenon. Songs about this ("Lean On Me"?) make more sense to me than endless songs about the wonderfulness of some idealized being.&nbsp;</li></ul></div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-73901501309853388912016-07-31T17:59:00.003-04:002016-07-31T17:59:25.042-04:00consider the leavesIt's challenging to convey the dreadful <i>anxieties</i>&nbsp;that might be associated with seriously evaluating doubts about lifelong bedrock beliefs. The emotions are reminiscent of a free fall with nothing to grab onto anymore...or the protective roof of your existence being torn off...or the creeping realization that your faulty compass has been misdirecting you for the past two days (weeks, months, years). The prospect of this experience is partly why <i>cognitive</i> defenses only need to be <a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2014/10/smokescreens-or-bogus-refuges.html" target="_blank">passable smokescreens</a>.<br /><div><br /></div><div>Fortunately, a more moderate version is available. In place of boldly considering that a supernatural thing is an outright fake, there's the gentler suggestion, "What if it went on leave temporarily?" Phrased differently, is it having a time of rest? Because this is solely a metaphor to spur clarification, taking leave doesn't need to be an "official" logical possibility for the thing. It's a frame of reference for constructing a set of illuminating questions. Any of them which are, allegedly, obvious to the point of&nbsp;<i>offensiveness</i>&nbsp;should also be harmless to answer:&nbsp;</div><div><ul><li>To start, what would be the contrasting&nbsp;<i>indications</i> that the thing either is on leave or isn't? What would be different during the leave? If the thing is fills a unique position like some workers do at companies, its leave would become noticeable somehow sometime. Would usual tasks not be completed? Would it verbalize advance warning of its leave, and to whom and how? If its leave were entirely sudden and unannounced, how would this surprise secretive leave nevertheless affect—or <i>not</i>&nbsp;<i>at all</i> affect—the normal course of oblivious people and objects?</li><li>How would the <i>end</i> of the leave be known? Would the end be for certain? At the slightest ambiguous sign, is it probable that some of the thing's admirers would be too eager to presume that the leave is over? Could they unintentionally deceive themselves? What would sort out their self-deceptions from the genuine end?</li><li>Most radically of all, what if the thing <i>has already been</i> on leave for a long while? Or it's been on leave intermittently in the past? What were the observable boundaries of these intervals? Are the "data points" for these boundaries appropriately global/cosmic in scale? Lastly, if it hasn't ever been on leave, how can that be substantiated, preferably even by dedicated cynics?</li></ul><div>Any number of the preceding questions might have responses of varying soundness. This is okay. The major aim isn't to make believers speechless; it's to go through the exercise of reviewing&nbsp;the questions and responses. In the process, this review rigorously bares and tests the belief's distinct justifications. Putting a belief to work answering straightforward questions yields insight into what it's made of. Like the supernatural things themselves, the beliefs shouldn't be permitted to remain on leave from practicalities forever.</div></div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-4075725250485486802016-07-27T15:17:00.003-04:002016-07-27T15:17:45.502-04:00speculative gratitudeSome beneficial acts don't receive the appreciation they deserve. <i>Preventions</i>&nbsp;are in that category. Although they decrease the risk of a tragic event, the result&nbsp;might earn barely any credit. A tragic event which <i>doesn't</i> happen is an invisible&nbsp;<i>nonevent</i>, so the prevention's valuable role is superficially invisible too. If the event has several complex factors affecting its occurrence, one might be tempted to wonder how much that single prevention truly helped to stop it. Worse, a tragic event which <i>does</i> happen casts immediate doubt on a prevention's effectiveness at reducing risk; it didn't "work". In an unfair twist, it will do that whether or not the prevention's promoters were completely upfront that risk wouldn't be <i>eliminated</i>.<br /><br />In the more noticeable examples of prevention, the act is discernibly connected to a chain of causes and effects. It readjusted the path of this chain like a railroad switch connecting up alternative train tracks to form a redirected route. The original risk and the lessened risk are clear-cut. It's often seen better in retrospect. For instance, having a <i>spare</i> item is a prevention that's utterly justified right <i>after</i>&nbsp;the first item is lost or broken. <i>Not</i> having the spare would have led to the event of lacking the item. The prevention has ensured that the lacking "reality" is now contrary to fact: it's a happily avoided <i>counterfactual</i>. The happier deviations that define it, <i>and</i> the preventions that introduced these deviations, are demarcated, specific, and identifiable.<br /><br />This imaginative mode of understanding is abstract, but another word for a counterfactual is a <i>story</i>. Storytelling commands human awareness. When a counterfactual is backed by a vivid story, its features come alive. It recruits the showier layers of consciousness. The appeal overshadows levelheaded estimates of low plausibility. A possibility might be highly unlikely, but if it&nbsp;<i>feels</i> real enough then it gives the impression that it was previously <i>on the verge</i> of coming true—until a decisive prevention intervened.<br /><br />A last important analytical link is the prevention's performing <i>agent</i>. As surely as each counterfactual is linked to the prevention that rendered it a mere counterfactual, each prevention is linked to whatever agent put it into action. Hence, for a given agent, its unique influences and abilities effectively limit the preventions that have been or could be performed. If it were one average U.S. citizen, they wouldn't be individually praised for preventing armed conflict on the other side of the Earth (or scolded for not preventing it).<br /><br />On the other hand, this commonsense limit breaks when the agent is <i>omnipotent yet covert</i>. An agent with these qualities could do virtually anything, <i>but</i> it doesn't openly affirm its miracle work when/if it ever does. The ramification is that there's no firm basis for distinguishing <i>exactly</i> what it has done and what it was aiming for. So the range of its hypothetical past preventions isn't inherently restricted. Did it act to prevent counterfactual scenarios P, Q, R, S, and so on? ...<i>Maybe</i>. It could have been involved.<br /><br />When it comes to converting newcomers, there's a drawback in too thoroughly extending the concept of prevention to such an agent. If the agent constantly receives adoration motivated by the <i>nonexistence</i> of miscellaneous counterfactuals, then gradually it looks less and less like an objective, independent entity. It looks more and more like an idolized empty shell with medals pinned to it for invented reasons. Anyone can spin myriad tales of prevented tragedies large and small. These aren't narrowly targeted proofs of an agent's undeniable deeds. It's not persuasive to hear expressions of personal gratitude for personal&nbsp;<i>speculations</i>&nbsp;regarding deflected personal calamities. The endless trend is hard to miss: whenever a person can envision a way that their existence <i>could</i> have been worse for them, they won't run out of rationales for applauding the agent they hold responsible.<br /><br />In addition, it has a second drawback that newcomers may spot. The belief ends up sounding greedy in a closely related "optimistic" form. According to the agent's own principle of making the believer's existence <i>less bad</i>, it probably isn't flatly opposed to making their existence&nbsp;<i>more good</i> too. If it is said to have intentionally steered <i>away</i> from unreal&nbsp;adverse events they envision, then shouldn't they ponder why it has intentionally <i>not</i> steered <i>toward</i>&nbsp;unreal enjoyable events they envision? To be sure, not starving merits recognition. But it's a benevolent sculptor of the cosmos, after all. Why quit there? What would have been so terrible about having a <i>small</i> fortune?Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-16085436398709988532016-07-18T21:56:00.004-04:002016-07-18T21:56:55.105-04:00litter litmusOf all the litmus tests to measure the inclination to avoid causing harm, <i>littering</i> is admittedly a low priority, relatively speaking. If I were somehow forced to <i>choose exclusively</i>&nbsp;between someone passing the test of not littering or passing the test of not attacking another, then of course I would choose the latter. If an incredibly bizarre situation implied that littering would reduce the threat to someone's life or body or property (distracting a predator?), then I wouldn't object. But the <i>pettiness</i> of normal, unforced littering is actually the main point of why I view it as an informative litmus test! Specifically:<br /><div><br /></div><div>First, the gain from littering is pitiful. The bother of transporting the piece of litter to a nearby receptacle is usually almost nothing. Someone who had the ability to transport something with them <i>before</i> it became "litter" doesn't abruptly lose that ability; empty containers take less effort than full ones. It's easier to comprehend an uncharitable decision when the reward from it is significant and prone to dominating the decision-maker's thoughts prior to the act. Littering can't fall back on that explanation.</div><div><br /></div><div>Second, the gain from littering is temporary, but the undesirable effects of it will last longer. It's short-sighted. The minutes, perhaps hours, that littering spares someone are outweighed by the long time in which the litter will have the opportunity to irritate.<br /><br />Third, the future impact will be (or would be) borne by people who are unknown. To show benevolence toward familiar people, especially people who will potentially repay the benevolence, isn't as revealing. In a sense, reluctance to litter is a sign of solidarity with "society" as a whole, because it's impossible to know <i>who</i>&nbsp;in society will be affected. Not littering is an individual tribute to the "common good".<br /><br />Fourth, closely related to the third, not littering might signify that someone identifies with a guiding concept of model behavior. It might embody the willingness to ask the larger questions, "Would this decision be something that an ideal decision-maker would carry out? If everyone made this decision, what would happen? Would I approve of someone else making this decision?"<br /><br />Fifth, circling back to the admission from the opening paragraph, the repercussion of littering is minimal. So, its form of injury is gentle and easier to overlook. The level of consideration it's associated with is greater than the <i>baseline</i> level associated with not stealing, for instance. Not ruining the pleasantness of the setting they're in is a more stringent standard of avoiding "harm" to them.<br /><br />Day by day, I doubt that regular littering, or for that matter regularly <i>not</i> littering, is a conscientious selection, reassessed again and again. To the contrary, I'd primarily blame influences which are more or less automatic: personal habit and social custom. The importance of context shouldn't be underestimated. I wouldn't be surprised to find that litter and littering could be unquestioned parts of someone's learned way of life. Consequently, they would see litter itself as innocuous, and the litmus test I'm rambling on about wouldn't occur to them—it wouldn't function as a test. From my perspective, that's a sadder result than failing it.</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-49377568328372477022016-07-11T21:42:00.001-04:002016-07-11T21:42:12.416-04:00results may varyIt's common to receive plenty of captivating stories in reply to the straightforward question, "In your personal history, what have been some detectable <i>effects</i> of the existence of _____, the supernatural concept you follow?" And it's as equally common for the stories to have several dubious characteristics. Like a placebo pill relieving pain, the effect in the story might have been <a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2014/05/wholly-holey-holy-moods-and-epiphanies.html" target="_blank">largely subjective in nature</a>. Or it might have been embedded in a highly complex situation affected by an inseparable mixture of factors (e.g. the economy?), and the exact role played by delicate supernatural guidance would be&nbsp;<a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-god-of-loaded-dice.html" target="_blank">impossible to distinguish</a>&nbsp;by a disinterested observer. Or a repeated effect might occur <i>sporadically</i>. Granted, irregular timing isn't a clinching argument against an effect's validity. Nevertheless this characteristic should arouse suspicion. <i>Coincidental rare events </i>could happen independently, at the same rates, during the same time period, with equal probability.<br /><div><br /></div><div>To the questioner, an effect with unknowable timing seems like an&nbsp;<i>awful</i>&nbsp;motive to persistently follow a concept. After the concept's effects have failed to turn up time after time in the past, why would someone feel inclined to&nbsp;<i>currently</i> choose to follow it again? The key to understanding is to examine the choice from the viewpoint of the storytelling followers instead. In the moment they aren't choosing whether to <i>renew</i>&nbsp;their embrace of the concept; they're choosing whether to <i>quit</i>&nbsp;embracing it. They intensely remember the stories of when the effects have occurred before. And yet they know from experience the many cases in which they haven't.<br /><br />Ergo they've intuited that those many cases of <i>nonoccurrence</i>&nbsp;have been temporary. So, they can eagerly <i>disregard</i> a recent sequence of cases of nonoccurrence whenever they contemplate the current choice. That choice presents two possibilities: if they continue on then the effect&nbsp;<i>might</i>&nbsp;reoccur, but if they quit now then it&nbsp;<i>certainly</i> won't. If they continue, they might be blissfully vindicated in the present; these vindications aren't definite but do occur <i>often enough</i>&nbsp;to leave fresh memories. If they continue and the effect isn't there, then at least there'll be more chances in the future...as long as they keep those chances "alive" by refusing to stop in the meantime. They're led to wonder if <i>this</i>&nbsp;will soon be the time that some kind of corroborating effect reappears.<br /><br />If the description sounds familiar, there's a good reason. It's an example of the widely applicable principle of a variable-ratio schedule of reinforcement. It's a strength, not a problem, for the effects to vary intermittently. The variance "trains" someone to retry no matter what. The lackluster <i>statistics</i>&nbsp;that the schedule generates can't compete with the pleasing surprises that the statistics are summarizing. A broken pattern attracts attention to positive results while a steady pattern deflects it.<br /><br />Moreover, the schedule encourages two tendencies that feed itself. First, because it boosts someone's alertness so that they won't <i>miss</i>&nbsp;any effects that come along, they're more prone to categorize events as effects than to not. Events on the margin will be called effects, so the margin will in effect be redrawn in a lenient manner. And then it could be redrawn again, etc. Second, because a larger set of samples has a greater yield of unlikely outcomes, they're moved to <i>merge</i> their monitoring with peers who are <i>also</i> looking for effects of the <i>same</i> concept. Therefore, when any one of them monitors an effect and reports it, everyone can count it. Through their sharing of one another's occurrences—but not the stunningly boring news of each nonoccurrence, of course—they have a steadier supply to feed their commitment, even if the effects in their <i>own</i> lives aren't that steady.<br /><br />The lesson here is to be prepared for a muted reaction to pointed questions about the fitful temperament of the effects that someone has narrated. The storyteller already realizes the long-suffering patience this characteristic demands. Their ongoing inability to forecast the <i>next</i> (supposed) manifestation of their concept's existence is partly why they're reluctant to <i>give up</i> on it too quickly.</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-45851693489295779922016-06-28T22:07:00.001-04:002016-06-28T22:07:09.649-04:00define faithlessUntil I subscribed to materialistic naturalism, I didn't fully appreciate the <i>rhetorical</i> disadvantages it can have. So many other perspectives have been dominant throughout history. One of the subtler aspects of this historical domination is <i>language.</i>&nbsp;Words' various denotations and connotations lend greater support to one side. Productive discussions are more difficult. (Peter Boghossian has stressed this deceptive slipperiness of common words.)<br /><div><br /></div><div>"Faith" is one of these tilted words. It has accumulated diverse meanings and contexts of usage. It's happened to such an extent that, depending on the applied definition, I'm <i>not technically "faithless"</i>. Apparently, I'm&nbsp;not&nbsp;faithless in the following broad ways.<br /><ul><li><i>loyalty</i>. This kind of faith appears more often in the word "faithful". Whether the focus is a group or a cause, it refers to an undivided commitment. It requires refusing to <i>betray/abandon</i>&nbsp;the group or cause, especially when that would be easier or more profitable, or when competing pressures arise. Of course, the list of potential loyalties that need no supernatural frame is a lengthy one. Advocates of materialistic naturalism can be faithful to them without any contradiction whatsoever. In my experience, they have above-average contrarian tendencies and they prize their independence, but they're as loyal as everyone else to the groups or causes which they deliberately join.&nbsp;</li><li><i>not capricious</i>. This kind of faith is about not being controlled by whims. It's holding firm to an idea, not continuously dropping and picking it back up as the mood strikes. But the total opposite is undesirable as well:&nbsp;<i>never ever</i> discarding ideas is possibly a sign of aloof, complacent stagnation. Like the majority of faults, it's easier to perceive either incorrect extreme in others than in oneself. My winding path to materialistic naturalism was prolonged, careful, and informed. The very end represented a huge distance from the very start. But it wasn't capricious.&nbsp;</li><li><i>reliable communication</i>. This kind of faith is akin to credibility. It's the dedication to uphold one's own statements—to fulfill promises. It's backing statements with actions whenever applicable. It's paying the statements' costs. And I would say that this principle is <i>more compatible</i> with my current view than my former one. It fits well with the principle of estimating ideas' accuracy precisely according to the quality and quantity of corroboration. Both principles express that ideas should neither be held nor expressed in a manner which is isolated from realities and efforts. Just as prospective truths should be evaluated by linking them to the <i>consequences</i> they have (or in fact don't as the case may be), personal statements should have <i>consequences</i> on the speaker's behavior.</li><li><i>trust</i>. This kind of faith is directed at trusting other people or collections of people. It's not trusting them to <i>exist</i>, but trusting that they will do good. It's trust that they will make admirable decisions or at least struggle to enact their good intentions. Sometimes this faith in the person derives from an ongoing reciprocal relationship with them. If so then this faith might have been confirmed repeatedly for years. Faith in someone who has shown their goodwill is hardly a groundless leap in the dark.</li><li><i>positivity</i>. People plan, but they can't eliminate unfavorable chances. This kind of faith is the choice to not obsess on these risks. I'm fine with this, because someone may highlight the happier outcomes in their imaginations&nbsp;<i>while</i> they acknowledge the realistic odds of each <i>and</i> they prepare for misfortunes. This contemplation isn't worthless if it provides them motivation and guidance. And after they've <i>already done all they reasonably can</i>, having faith in a beneficial outcome causes no harm.</li><li><i>acceptance of imperfect proof</i>. This kind of faith consists of proceeding on the basis of <i>provisional</i> ideas. It may be argued that any idea without <i>invincible authority</i>&nbsp;implies that someone must take it on faith; therefore faith is something everyone uses all the time, and it's hypocritical to not embrace it in the argued context. The error of this conclusion is that the category of ideas with imperfect proof is wide and mixed. This indiscriminate mass of ideas represents a crucial <i>gradient</i>&nbsp;of differing likelihoods. These differences are decisive. If validating an idea with "merely" a 90% likelihood qualifies as faith...then yes, I suppose I'm not faithless. But it's ludicrous to propose that an idea of 90% likelihood successfully earning my "faith" logically forces me to respond similarly to ideas of 10% likelihood.</li><li><i>awe</i>. Some commonly try to associate awe with faith in specific beliefs—probably theirs. Either the awe inspires the faith, or the faith provokes and enables the awe, or awe and faith are more or less synonymous. They may murmur, "How can you not have faith? Don't you feel awe?" The honest answer is that I do—right before I cheerily skip the presumption of blaming it on something mysterious. At times one can be awestruck by an astounding yet <i>demystifying</i> explanation<i>.</i>&nbsp;Real objects of awe, i.e. things much grander than the scale of human existence, are everywhere. Classifying episodes of awe as faith would end up classifying me again as not faithless. (Or, ugh, "spiritual".) &nbsp;</li><li><i>interest in paramount ideas</i>. Right along with awe, some associate faith with any strong interest in paramount ideas. That's faith's "territory". They characterize faith-based thinking as deep, profound, introspective, elevating contentment over greed, and searching for luminous beings and not this crude matter. So reluctance to indulge in faith is shallow and mundane. The snag in this self-congratulatory generalization is that it conveniently ignores the opposite result: when less reverence for obtaining answers through faith <i>is an effect&nbsp;</i>of the determination to systematically investigate the questions. If thoughtful, fervent interest in paramount ideas is exclusive to faith, then I'm not faithless.&nbsp;</li></ul>Now that I've rambled on a while about not being faithless, am I a "person of faith" in the usual smug sense of that label? I'd rather not call myself that, and I suspect nobody else would find it helpful. I realize that by the most prominent definition I'm <i>thoroughly</i> faithless: I lack religious affiliation and all of its numerous expressions.&nbsp;</div><div><br /></div><div>My complaint is how this definition of faith is unintentionally <i>accompanied</i> by the peripheral faith definitions I listed. Placing&nbsp;<i>people</i> under the heading of faith grants them a halo (ha!) side-effect of hinting that they possess the qualities in the faith list. And barring people from it hints that they might not. I imagine the practical impact will shrink, as the social status of the concept of a person of faith continues to dwindle. If that vacancy were later filled by the scrupulously vague concept "person of patchwork spirituality", I'd judge it to be an improvement regardless.<br /><div><br />Lastly, I'm compelled to mention the faith definition that writers with my view frequently prefer to underline: the <i>practice</i>&nbsp;of willfully neglecting, or only superficially pretending, to judge a given idea's accuracy via the means of neutral inquiry and analysis. Becoming progressively more and more faithless by&nbsp;<i>this</i> notion of faith nudged me to reexamine my opinions. I like to have faith that more people will be faithless in this regard too.</div></div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-71522716931447739762016-05-22T11:40:00.001-04:002016-05-22T11:40:08.098-04:00introspect at your own riskI've previously described connections between my present philosophy and the habits of thinking that I've absorbed at my software job. The catch is that all these habits of thinking are closer to suggestive comparisons than definite proofs. Others might not be that impressed. They might have an abstract technological job too but they routinely restrict the job's thinking style to work topics. Or they may attempt to apply it in directions that I oppose but they prefer ("a functioning program of high complexity implies a programmer"). Or they may explain with varying levels of credibility that this entire perspective is too specialized and mechanistic, so its metaphors are completely disqualified. They may ask, why am I seemingly obsessed with <i>surveying the details</i> of marvelous ideas, when the ideas feel so wonderful in rough outlines?<br /><div><br />One answer to that question is...that the obsession is partially an offshoot of another habit to add to the list. But this one is undoubtedly more widespread to projects outside software: <i>estimating prospective risk</i>. For planning any ambitious project, it's essential to start as early as possible to uncover and compensate for risks to success. Fantasizing about the advantages it will have after completion is allowable, but sooner rather than later someone needs to confront tedious questions about the grounds for its potential existence. What will be the signs that it's done? What will it be made from? Who will make it? How many weeks will it take them? How many overlooked mysteries remain about its behavior? In one sentence, what are the actual risks of actualizing it?<br /><br />The habit of estimating prospective risk doesn't mean that the estimator is <i>incapable</i> of <a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2014/05/meaningful-goals.html" target="_blank">dreaming of improvements</a>. It might mean that like me they grow...<i>leery</i>&nbsp;of suggestions which are massive yet ill-defined. The effort to take a risk inventory demands sharper clarity, because the larger or fainter it is, the more risk it carries. Until the team determines what it will be expected to do, they don't know the constraints they will be working to satisfy. And they can't productively speculate about the risks of achieving the constraints. Itemizing the conditions to make something physical depends upon sketching the contours of that something with high specificity. Whether the thing discussed is a project or not, whether it's awe-inspiring or not, the habit of estimating prospective risk urges the question of the tangible requirements it would need to fulfill for it to be real.&nbsp;</div>Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-78714943412815226512016-05-03T14:08:00.001-04:002016-05-03T14:08:48.564-04:00rickety trellisFor a large class of imagined complaints about materialistic naturalism, an appropriate reply is "go talk with the real people being stereotyped". If the complainer did, they might discover that advocates of materialistic naturalism aren't abominable, uncaring wretches. I've speculated that it partly comes from an <a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2014/11/the-prejudice-of-1-d-vision.html" target="_blank">old, laughable one-dimensional yardstick</a>&nbsp;which mixes up religiosity and miscellaneous flourishing. The assumption is that everyone who most closely follows the <i>correct</i> system of beliefs is consistently better off than everyone who doesn't. To make the yardstick work, the numerous exceptions need to be ignored or reconciled. "That unhappy believer is doing it wrong." &nbsp;"You only <i>think</i> you're happy when you're disagreeing with me." &nbsp;"Pressuring people into (the right flavor of) religion makes them better citizens, children, etc."<br /><br />One of these narrow-minded complaints is about not supporting&nbsp;<i>personal growth</i>. Some people strongly link self-improvement with the influence and pursuit of supernatural ideas, or at least motions in the general direction of "spirituality". As a result they deduce that unconvinced people like me are allegedly indifferent, pessimistic, discouraging, or even hostile toward self-improvement <i>itself</i>. We must be against self-improvement...because we're eager to spread the distinctive philosophical principle that, as much as possible, ideas shouldn't be followed without carefully checking the accuracy of the ideas' implications through logic and investigation.<br /><br />I remember this dehumanizing cliché well from when I was on the other side. By definition "secular" people didn't believe in anything but atoms, and they believed that humanity was an offshoot of precursor animal species. Therefore they had no defense to living in a totally&nbsp;<i>bestial, debauched</i>&nbsp;mode. They had no ultimate trial in the afterlife to anticipate, so they didn't have motivation to contemplate ethics. Of course this harmonizes with the shallow accusation of dismissing former beliefs purely in order to live without rules.<br /><br />In any form, the prejudice is ill-founded. I'm pleased by the effort to nurture greater excellence in people, when it isn't coercive. Although the list of worthwhile goals is debatable, <i>especially</i>&nbsp;the goals' specifics, I'd venture that my list of aspirations has many overlaps with the complainers'. I too would like to see more effective self-management, more empathy, less obsession on inanimate goods, more clear-headed decisions and thinking, less procrastination, more awareness of consequences, less fearfulness, more compromise for the benefit of all. These goals are <i>generic</i>. Someone can have these goals without first following beliefs with questionable corroboration. (For that matter, I know for certain that many followers don't <i>broadly</i> reject the goal of checking ideas' implications for accuracy; they <i>dilute</i> it by applying it very selectively and by accepting error-prone methods of "checking".)<br /><br />Furthermore, the beliefs'&nbsp;<i>role</i> in personal growth is just as generic. It's comparable to a <i>trellis&nbsp;</i>for plants to grow on. A trellis has some characteristics which provide a setting and assistance for growth to happen. Yet no trellis is uniquely capable. A working trellis can have a variety of colors, sizes, shapes, and source materials.<br /><br />By analogy, beliefs&nbsp;can function as a trellis for personal growth and still have issues. It might be circulating inaccuracies about topics large and small. Nevertheless it might supply opportunities for guided quiet reflection, mentors and peers, inspiration to grander ideals, confidence that behavior is malleable. Like the advice <a href="http://ripplingbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2015/12/nonsectarian-laying-down.html" target="_blank">to lay down tensions</a>, some of its characteristics benefit personal growth <i>despite</i> the context of suspect beliefs. I concede that the kind of beliefs I discarded have in some ways acted as an adequate trellis.<br /><br />All the same, this trellis strikes me as a <i>rickety</i> one. To keep up the metaphor, it's a trellis that doesn't endure. It breaks after the assaults of erosion and too much weight. Or perhaps it's a trellis that's too little or misshapen. Its limitations or crookedness cause it to be outgrown. It might function for a while, but its downsides then emerge. Someone asks a forbidden question. The repeated failures to correspond to revealed realities pile up. The society's controlling pressure starts to feel constrictive. Stagnation arrives after the easier stages are done. Punishments elevate docile, cookie-cutter conformity over self-directed progress. "Moral instruction" abruptly veers into odd obsessions with apparently harmless activities.<br /><br />In the end, I can follow materialistic naturalism and continue recognizing that growth is important. As I see it, my view forces <i>greater</i> emphasis on having the best people there can be. They're <i>all we have</i>, on the working premise that spectral rescuers can't be relied upon. Essentially, growth is now&nbsp;<i>too</i> important to rely on the same old rickety trellis.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-62526852356530371172016-04-23T10:06:00.000-04:002016-04-23T10:06:40.625-04:00Incredible Aid<b>Faith</b>: Hello. You've reached the phone line for questions about Incredible Aid. My name is Faith. What's yours?<br /><b>Pru</b>: Pru.<br /><b>Faith</b>: And what would you like to know about our service today?<br /><b>Pru</b>: The description I read was sort of vague. What kind of aid do you do?<br /><b>Faith</b>: We do a wide range. We aren't restricted to any one kind.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Which kinds, then? Do you have examples?<br /><b>Faith</b>: That depends on you. Whatever you need. We don't want to discourage you from making requests to us, even if a request doesn't fit the mold.<br /><b>Pru</b>: But there are limits, right? You can't carry out every demanding request.<br /><b>Faith</b>: That's correct. You may pass along any request that makes sense to you, but it's up to our discretion alone whether to take action.<br /><b>Pru</b>: ...isn't that your role? Providing aid on request?<br /><b>Faith</b>: We have great expertise handling these decisions. Requestors must defer to our superior judgment.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Will you inform me if you decline?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Probably not.<br /><b>Pru</b>: I see... Why is it called "incredible" aid? Are you capable of unusual <i>levels</i> of aid?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Oh yes, beyond question. Our reach extends farther than anyone else. We have immeasurable resources that we could put to use if we chose.<br /><b>Pru</b>: I know I called this phone number only to ask for more information before signing up. How does someone contact you with actual, urgent requests?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Just say it. Whisper, shout, mutter. Or think it without moving your lips. Either way, we'll detect it remotely.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Um...so are you always listening and watching, even when I'm not trying to express a request?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Less privacy is an unavoidable side-effect of our constant 24-7 attention to you.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Well, when I do have a request, how will you tell if I'm being serious, or if I'm muttering something without thinking it through? What if you have sensible follow-up questions for me?<br /><b>Faith</b>: We'll know. We won't ever bombard you with questions in return.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Then how can I be sure that you've heard, and you've completely understood me?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Trust us.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Would you respond to a request in a way I don't expect?<br /><b>Faith</b>: At least some of the time.<br /><b>Pru</b>: When that happens, will you explain why?<br /><b>Faith</b>: No. Blunt information isn't the kind of aid we give.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Well, do you leave a note after providing aid? I don't mean to be rude, but how many requests have you accepted, on average?<br /><b>Faith</b>: We have pages and pages of incredible testimonials. For instance, many of those are interesting anecdotes about strangely helpful coincidences. Or about assistance from compassionate strangers.<br /><b>Pru</b>: If I don't need the extra aid for myself most of the time, can I ask for aid for close family members?<br /><b>Faith</b>: By all means. Our policy is virtually unlimited. You may petition for aid for everyone you know. Some do it for people they don't know. Fairly often we hear from a large group all at once. I think they do it in case we missed what only one of them said.<br /><b>Pru</b>: But that's impossible. What if they contradict each other?<br /><b>Faith</b>: We know which ones to ignore. We distribute incredible aid according to the best outcome we can manage.<br /><b>Pru</b>; What's your price? Is it a yearly subscription?<br /><b>Faith</b>: No price to get started.<br /><b>Pru</b>: And later?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Long-term we do expect evidence of deep commitment. That includes regular contributions in proportion to household income. We also expect each client to do whatever they can to bring us more clients.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Is there a lower tier?<br /><b>Faith</b>: I don't recommend it. Those who are less committed are generally unsure about the priority assigned to them.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Can I quit at any time?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Yes. As we see it, those who end up canceling couldn't have been full-fledged clients anyway.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Is there a penalty?<br /><b>Faith</b>: There will be some feelings of betrayal. We strongly encourage close bonds between clients. Actually, we prefer that our clients go to each other for aid first, before involving us.<br /><b>Pru</b>: Hold on. You've said that your aid is amazing and powerful. But my requests for aid aren't openly acknowledged...and I can't identify what form the aid is in...and my total commitment is required. Now you're saying that I should just be working with the other clients you connect me to? Are—are you a cult?<br /><b>Faith</b>: Thank you for calling. We hope that you will be joining us at Incredible Aid: Aid You Won't Believe.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29876314.post-77531216719968218592016-04-16T10:00:00.000-04:002016-04-16T10:00:36.510-04:00big talkGavin is headed leisurely down the sidewalk. He spots someone wearing a kitschy&nbsp;<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandwich_board" target="_blank">sandwich board</a>&nbsp;that reads simply "THINK BIG". As he curses his own sense of curiosity, he approaches. Before he can speak, the wearer shakes his hand and strikes up the conversation. (After a while, he takes off the sandwich board and they find somewhere nearby to sit.)<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Glad you stopped to chat. Call me Biggs. And you?<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Gavin. So, what is it your sign wants me to think big about?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Everything. <i>Bigness</i> is what you should focus your attention on. What do you believe is the central truth of existence?<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Do you mean religiously, or...<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Yes, but "religion" is nothing except a label. Language is a symbol, and symbols are inadequate substitutes for the reality of bigness. Bigness cannot be labeled.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: The bigness of what?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness itself. Bigness surrounding and joining all things. No one thing is big enough to be bigness all on its own.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Isn't bigness a description, though? How can you believe in bigness without being more specific about what the bigness is describing?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness isn't shown through one specific thing. If all things vanished or shrunk, bigness would still be bigness. Bigness is eternal and needs nothing else. Bigness forms new things from out of its excess supply, like a fountain spewing droplets.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Um, how can I tell if I'm believing in the <i>real</i> bigness or not?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Belief is less important than <i>connecting</i> with bigness. Feel it. Don't fight it.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Then how can I tell if I'm feeling it or fighting it?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Like I said, the sensation of bigness is bigger than I can explain. You feel it when you're opening your arms to embrace the grandest cosmic wholeness of the universe. You fight it when you're being selfish and closed off. You experience a sliver of bigness when you realize you're like a fish in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceanic_feeling" target="_blank">a wide ocean</a>.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Which substances would you personally recommend taking for enhancing that?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Indulge or don't. The bigness is present before and after whether you do or not.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Where did the bigness come from? Will it end? What does it want? What does it do? Does it think?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness is bigger than beginnings and endings. Its wants and actions are more than we can comprehend. We're too small to translate the concepts in its thoughts. It's always pushing forward, changing. When we ride it we want to have more unity, to be more than shrunken individuals.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: ...evolution would have to be started by bigness, though, right? Evolution depends on different rates of the survival and reproduction of individuals—or separate groups of individuals. Is evolution against bigness?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness has a bigger purpose. Through evolution the deaths make future lives better.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: You just said "better". Bigness does have a morality about what's better?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Better means more variety, more complexity, more range of expression. That kind of better might not be good <i>for us</i> all the time.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Are we usually on the side of bigness, then?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness doesn't choose sides. Bigness is bigger than sides. Bigness can't be stopped by anything. For our own benefit, we should listen closer to the lessons of bigness.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: If bigness can work through competition, can't competing be a form of listening closer to the lessons of bigness? What about natural aggressiveness?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Competition and aggression are for beings that can't plug into bigness directly. Humanity can do that. Bigness develops into self-awareness through tiny pieces of it like us.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: At what moment in its species development did humanity gain that power? Can anyone do it at any time in their life?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: I said it was a feeling. We had the power as soon as we were conscious of what we were truly feeling.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Is it possible that we could have a feeling, but it's not as meaningful as it appears?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness is bigger than appearances. Its meaningfulness is what it is, no more, definitely no less.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: With this much vagueness, can't bigness be part of any belief system?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness is bigger than belief systems. It's wise to recognize that our beliefs about it are never completely right or finished. We know for sure that it's <i>not</i>&nbsp;just this and <i>not</i>&nbsp;just that.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: So...violent, oppressive, fearful beliefs would be...<br /><i>Biggs</i>: In essence, rejections of bigness.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: The good parts are manifestations of bigness, the bad parts aren't?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness is bigger than narrow notions of good and bad. People revise their rigid rules in better or worse directions depending on the quality of their bond with bigness.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: And the moral dilemmas that people decide differently than one another?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: They decide as they're inside the frame of their lives. Bigness is bigger than anyone's life.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: What would you say if someone else had different <i>ideas</i>&nbsp;than yours about bigness?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness is bigger than my ideas and their ideas. We can both be partially right, because we're touching different aspects of it.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: ...to recap, bigness in the abstract is everything and nothing, but it can be felt in a dumbfounded state of mind. By feeling it we're supposed to be less self-centered all the time. It's the origin and also the sum total of everything. Calling it "bigness" is too uninspired, though. Would you rather call it "God"?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: Bigness is bigger—<br /><i>Gavin</i>: Yes, of course, forget I asked. What's the point, given that we can't apply it or understand it?<br /><i>Biggs</i>: We can in limited ways. We get perspective. Everyone has a drive to be part of something big. We should confess that we already are. When we do, the tininess of our mishaps, worries, cravings, debates is crystal clear.<br /><i>Gavin</i>: I've got to admit that I've heard of worse beliefs. The problem is that I'd prefer well-supported interpretations and solutions to the stuff you mentioned. It's all tiny, I guess, but if I'm tiny too then it's not <i>tiny to me</i>.Art Vandalayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08432367996173233599noreply@blogger.com0